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LiBRARY OF CONGRESS. 






UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 



Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive 
in 2011 witii funding from 
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PLEASURE-CYCLING. 



PLEASURE-CYCLING 



BY 



HENRY CLY^DE 




BOSTON 
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPAXY 

1895 



Copyright, 1895, 
By Little, Brown, and Company. 



^ntbrrsttg Press : 
John "VVii-son and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. 



PREFACE. 



TN this little book, the writer, looking 
-*- back to his own days of inexperience 
in cycling, has endeavored to furnish some 
useful information and advice to those who 
intend joining the army of w^lieelmen, or 
who, in their first season on the road, are 
beginning to appreciate the healthy pleasure 
which cycling brings. The book being es- 
pecially intended to aid the amateur rider 
of the safety bicycle in the intelligent use 
of his wheel, the writer has kept that pur- 
pose closely in view, and has not included 
matters aside from it ; such, for example, as 
the history of the development of the bicy- 
cle, and training for track and road racing. 

Further, the writer has attempted, per- 
haps too emphatically as some may think, to 



b PREFACE. 

commend the merits of bicycling as a means 
towards innocent enjoyment and healthy liv- 
ing. But if, to persons as yet ignorant of 
the art and mystery of wheeling, he may 
seem to speak extravagantly, he is sure that 
his book will not be the subject of such re- 
proach from those to whom, as to himself, 
the bicycle has brought a new and durable 
pleasure into life. 

The book has been written solely for the 
instruction and benefit of cyclers in pursuit 
of health and pleasure ; and, whatever crit- 
icism the opinions expressed in it may meet, 
they have at least the merits of honesty 
and independence. 

The writer's acknowledgments are due to 
the Pope Manufacturing Company of Hart- 
ford, Connecticut, for permission to repro- 
duce the illustrations contained in the book ; 
and to friends for advice and suggestions 
generously given while it was in preparation. 

H. C. 

March, 1895. 



TRE WHEELMAN. 

Miirraurs of leaves and of brooks, the rhythmical beat 

of the breakers 
Pounding the curve of the shore^ and the sea-birds rest- 
lessly icheeling, — 
Bells of the kine on the hills and the click of the scythes 

i?i the meadow, — 
Scents of the fern from the pasture, the loild roses' bloom 

in the thicket, — 
Resinous breathing of pines, cool cloud-shadows crossiiig 

the mountains : 
These his, as he rides, self-contained atid exulting i?i 

motion, — 
JV'mds softly touching his face to whisper the secrets of 

summer, — 
Straight through the shadow and sunlight, swift as the 

birds, and as silent ! 

H. C. 

March, 1895. 



CONTENTS. 



Page 

I. The Poetry of ]Motiox .... 11 

II. Choosixg a Bicycle 31 

III. How to Ride 63 

lY. Takixg Care of a Bicycle . . . 103 

V. Dress and Equipmext 123 

YI. Cyclixg axd Health 141 

YII. Ox THE Road 165 

IXDEX iSl 



I. 

THE POETRY OF MOTION. 



''Never was the man of spirit the victim of ennui if 
his body was exposed to fatigue ; never did the man 
healthy of body fail to find life light if he had some- 
thing to engage his mifid'^ 

Alexandre Dumas. 




I. 




Of the million bicycles, or there- 
abouts, in use in the United 
States during the summer of 
1894, some hundreds were rid- 
den on the roads or race-tracks 
by amateur or professional rac- 
ing-men. Many thousands were used, wholly 
or in part, in the business of their owners, 
that is in going to and from offices, shops, 
or factories at morning and evening, carry- 
ing messages, taking orders, visiting patients, 
and making pastoral visits. But probably 
three quarters of the million wheels were 



14 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

devoted to pleasure-riding ; and if the use of 
the bicycle for this purpose increases as it 
seems bound to do, cycling is to become dis- 
tinctively our national sport. It may not 
become, or may not long remain, popular 
with the class which seeks only those sports 
that are made impossible to others by reason 
of their expensiveness or the need of special 
surroundings for the practice of them, but 
the inherent delight of riding is too bewitch- 
ing to be abandoned by most of those who 
have once experienced it. 

It is about the wheel, as a means of 
amusement and exercise, that this little 
book is written. But not only as a sport 
is cycling destined to furnish innocent and 
exquisite pleasure to thousands of men and 
women whose enjoyments heretofore, through 
the stress of narrow circumstances or of 
absorbing avocations, have been very lim- 
ited, ■ — not only is it to bring better health 
and sounder constitutions to this generation 
of young and middle-aged Americans, — it 
is to be the saver of time and muscle to busy 
men, who will adapt the wheel to a hundred 
purposes in their daily work for which they 



THE POETRY OF MOTION. 15 

have been accustomed to use their o\Yn un- 
assisted legs and lungs. When the bicycle 
has fairly taken its place as the popular 
vehicle of the day, the roads and highways 
must be adapted to it, and there will no 
longer be room for the rej^roach, now too 
true, that the common highways of the 
United States are vastly inferior to those 
of England and the continent of Europe.^ 
The safety bicycle is without doubt the 
safest road vehicle yet invented. It is fair 
to assume that nearly all the serious road 
accidents happening to cyclers have been 

1 The bicycle is now in use in nearly all the armies of 
Europe, and in that of Japan; and it is likely that, within 
a short time, a bicycle corps of couriers and scouts 
will become a part of the regular army of the United 
States, in spite of the difficulties which now attend 
movement by the wheel over the rough country in the 
"West, and the bad roads which are the rule rather than 
the exception throughout the interior of the country. In 
his Annual Report for 1892, Major General Miles said : 
"The results obtained, under the most adverse and dis- 
couraging conditions, prove conclusively that the bicycle 
Avill in the future prove to be a most valuable auxiliary 
in military operations, not only for courier service, but 
also for rapidly moving organized bodies of men over the 
countrv." 



16 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

recorded in the newspapers of the day ; and 
it will be found that by far the greater 
number of these have occurred by reason of 
the unskilfuhiess of tire rider or his gross 
carelessness, as by " coasting " in the night, 
or in failing to give warning of his approach 
in a frequented street. It is of course fair 
to exclude from the reckoning accidents 
occurring to professional or amateur racers 
competing with each other at close quarters, 
or to record-breakers on the road. 

Bicycling adapts itself to all sorts and 
conditions of men. No other out-door sport, 
unless it be the gentle croquet, can be prac- 
tised at all without a violent deoTee of 
physical exertion. This is especially true of 
base-ball, foot-ball, and tennis. But on a 
wheel you may jog along a country road at 
a iive-mile gait, or you may emulate Zim- 
merman upon the race-track. You may 
spin without conscious effort along a sub- 
urban '' boulevard," or you may, with the 
utmost exertion of wind and muscle, climb 
a long acclivity to dash breathlessly down 
on the other side. You may content your- 
self with a ten-mile ride each day, or you 



THE POETRY OF MOTIOiV. 17 

may train for a succession of century runs. 
Whatever measure of time and speed you 
adopt for yourself, you will find the sport 
a delight which grows with time and expe- 
rience. The wheelman and his wheel are 
one in a much closer degree than the eques- 
trian and his horse; for, as between the 
horse and his rider, there is often, if not 
always, a conflict of wills, whereas your 
wheel is, to all intents and purposes, a part 
of yourself, and answers as if by instinct to 
your every whim and purpose. Its power 
is so much added to your own, and as you 
vault into the saddle and feel the pedals 
under your feet, you mount into a realm 
of new possibilities. The petty vexations 
of life may pursue you on the road, but 
they cannot overtake you, for the black care 
that is said to sit behind the horseman can- 
not find room on the bicycle. Dulness, 
lassitude, headache, fly away on the breeze 
which your own motion creates. On the 
wheel, at least, you will find your own 
thoughts welcome companions, and whether 
you ride alone or in company you will never 
be lonely. 



18 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

You will find in this sport not only pleas- 
ure, but health. Every man possessed of 
two legs and a sound heart may take to the 
wheel with the assurance that his legs will 
grow stronger, his wind and digestion better, 
and his nerves less importunate. The tonic 
effect of the sport upon all the functions of 
the body is simply amazing. If a jaded 
business or professional man, overwrought 
and weary with his year's work and looking 
forward with apprehension to his work to 
come, will devote at the beginning of the 
season two hours each day to the wheel, he 
will find, in August, that his accustomed 
outing at seaside or mountains is no longer 
a necessity, and if he takes it, it will be with 
his wheel as a companion. 

Among the many benefits which cycling 
is to confer on us Americans, not the least 
is this, that it will confute the absurd notion 
that athletic and manly sports are exclu- 
sively for very young men, — a notion which 
has never obtained in England, where men 
of seventy shoot all day over rough land, or 
ride to hounds, or like Gladstone, are wood- 
choppers or indefatigable pedestrians. "To 




THE POETRY OF MOTION. 19 

say that a man is too old to ride is to state 
an absurdity. Wheeling is easier than walk- 
ing, and when a man is too old to walk he is 
ready to die. And he is 
never ready to do that." 

Scarcely less notable than 
its physical benefits is the 
influence for moral good 
which cycling brings to. 
every community where it 
is practised. The sport fosters wholesome 
thoughts and sane habits of living ; and the 
purely healthy excitement which it brings 
in such large measure makes unattractive 
that gross artificial excitement which is the 
chief attraction to the use of stimulants. 
Says a prominent clergyman ^ in one of our 
cities : " Many a saloon, with its baneful 
adjimcts of betting and gambling, has been 
forced to loosen its hold upon young man- 
hood since the advent of the wheel, and 
street corners, once foul and disgusting spots, 
have become clean and wholesome, just be- 
cause a clean and wholesome exercise has 
been provided for many who idly drifted 

1 Rev. Dr. Heischmann. 




20 PLEASURE-CYCLING, 

into the company of the profane and de- 
graded." 

Except rainy days, all times are good 
times to the wheelman. Dusty roads will 
never stop him, and a 
degree of heat which 
would overpower him 
walking produces but 
the slightest discomfort 
as he spins along in the 
breeze that he creates 
for himself. And that 
is a very muddy road through which the 
experienced wheelman cannot pick his way. 
Even sandy roads, which are an abomina- 
tion in very dry weather, afford the best of 
riding after a smart rain. 

In early summer, you may rise with the 
lark, or rather with the robin, and ride 
through the cool sweetness of the early 
morning along country roads, where the 
wild roses and buttercups are freshened by 
the dew, and the scent of newly mown hay 
fills the air. Twenty miles you make out 
and home, before the work of the day has 
fairly begun for lazy people who know not 



THE POETRY OF MOTION. 21 

the pleasures of the road and the wheel. 
Or you may ride in the August twilights, 
when the sunset glows crimson in the west 
or the great thunder clouds warn you to 
hasten home, along roads wdiere the air is 
heavy w4th the scents of the later wild 
flowers, and the whippoorwills are begin- 
ning to sing and the frogs to croak in the 
marshes. 

In the cooler air of September, you will 
ride longer and farther under the rolling 
fair weather clouds, through miles of golden- 
rod and asters, or along high bluffs or sandy 
beaches in sidit of the soft-soundim:j sea. 
But best of all, perhaps, are the October 
days. The wayside woods blaze with color ; 
the maples are scarlet and the beeches gold. 
The sumac glows red by the roadside, and 
the russet of the oaks warms into a royal 
crimson under the bright sun. The pines 
fill the air with a stimulating; frao-rance, the 
w^ind just breathes through them as you run 
softly through a wood road over the brown 
needles which they have been patiently 
dropping for you through many tree genera- 
tions. The tinkle of a cow-bell in a neigh- 



22 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

boring pasture only accents the silence. 
You will not be lonely, although your only 
companion may be a reel squirrel which 
essays to race with you along the stone 
wall, or an occasional rabbit sitting on his 
haunches in the undergrowth to see you 
pass. 

On a clear November morning, when a 
white frost has ushered in an Indian summer 
day, and the roads are beaten hard by the 
heavy autumn rains, you may start for a 
fifty-mile run, knowing that your wheel 
will be all alive under you, and that fatigue 
will fly away on the cool breeze. The dead 
leaves rustle under your wheels ; the late 
apple gatherers are at work in the roadside 
orchards; the blue smoke from burning 
leaves and rubbish rises here and there in 
the stripped cornfields ; the distant woods 
are shadowed in soft grays and purples. In 
the early afternoon, you stop at a country 
tavern that keeps a good fire and a hot din- 
ner ready for travellers. Then a rest and 
a smoke, — if you will smoke, — and home 
again in the cool early twilight. There, 
after you have changed and eaten, you may 



THE POETRY OF MOTION. 23 

lie back in your easy-chair, conscious of a 
day well spent as you bask in the light of 
the autumn wood fire, with just that deli- 
cious sense of fatigue that makes a luxury 
of repose, relating your day's adventures, 
if haply you find sympathetic ears to listen, 
or dreaming at intervals over the pages of 
some book of adventure, like Stevenson or 
Dumas, that fits into your mood, The 
morrow may bring its duties and cares, its 
bargains, or its briefs, or its sermon ; but for 
the night you are care-free, and you will 
permit nothing to disturb the serenity of 
your mind. 

Perhaps, under the evening lamp, you 
will fall to planning new excursions to 
come. Fortunate for you, if you do not 
hear a northeaster rising in the night, and 
get up in the morning to find the ground 
white with the season's first snow. For it 
is sadly true that in the winter season, gen- 
erally from the middle of November to the 
middle of April, if you spend it north of the 
Potomac, you must, practically, lay up your 
machine and forego the delights of cycling. 
Some enthusiastic riders, to be sure, will 



24 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

watch and wait for every favorable turn of 
winter weather, and ride even on the snow- 
covered roads, when these are in any way 
practicable. But the winter days, especially 
in the climate of New England, ahbrd but 
few opportunities for comfortable riding ; 
and most of us must let our wheels rest 
while we plan excursions for the far-away 
spring. If we are fortunately within reach 
of a riding-school or " rink," we may enjoy 
an occasional spin on its hard floor, — a poor 
substitute for the country road, but better 
than nothing. 

But if the cycler has to endure a winter 
of discontent, the spring brings to him a 
brighter promise than to others. In the 
dawn of the murky March mornings, he 
hears the cawing of the early crows making 
their northward journey, and they become 
for him halcyon birds. Muddy roads do not 
annoy him, for the worse the ways the 
sooner they will become settled. He hears 
with satisfaction the remark, uttered oftener 
and oftener, " the bicycles will soon be out," 
and he resolves to devote his next holiday, 
not to say the next Sunday, to cleaning and 



THE POETRY OF MOTION. 25 

setting up his machine. Soon he sees com- 
placent boys trundling single wheels along 
the pavement to or from the repair shop, and 
then an expressman's wagon crowned with a 
glittering new bicycle going out of town. 
At length comes the morning when he 
beholds the avenues leading to the city all 
dotted over with moving wheels, and he 
contemns business and engagements and 
makes haste for home and the road. That 
first ride of the season on a mild spring day 
is an event to be marked with a red letter 
in the cycler's calendar. 

Wheeling levels all degrees, and disproves 
the adage that " crabbed age and youth can- 
not live together." Like other healthy and 
manly sports, this brings to the surface the 
boyishness latent in every man who is worth 
his salt. The wheelman is your modern 
Don Quixote, who finds his way beset with 
small marvellous adventures. His fellow^ 
wheelmen, met upon the road, are for him 
good comrades, or objects of mild, benevolent 
curiosity. One has a tire mysteriously de- 
flated, and is in vain endeavoring to find the 
leak under the lee of the stone wall How 



26 



PLEASURE-CYCLING. 




ready are you to proffer him your advice and 
best assistance. A flock of hens, with a per- 
versity peculiar to 
their breed and 
sex, scuttle under 
the wheel of that 
clean cut young 
stranger in the 
crimson jersey, 
and one is nearly 
"' ~" decapitated. " 
you monkey on a bicycle I " screams an old 
woman, the owner of the foolish fowl, as she 
observes the accident from her doorway, and 
this appears to you an exceeding funny inci- 
dent in the human comedy as you ride up 
prepared to arbitrate differences between the 
virago and the bewildered youth. You meet 
a stout lady in navy blue ambling along at 
a five-mile gait. Her wheel-frame is fes- 
tooned with parcels, apparently of groceries, 
and a small milk-can depends gracefully 
from her handle-bar. You are sure that you 
know her, as she wheels from the highway 
into a lane that leads to a region of aban- 
doned farms. You stop in a convenient 



THE POETRY OF MOTION. 27 

shady fence-corner for a rest and a smoke. 
Soon comes another on a wheel numbered 
in the same series as your own, and you fall 
to discussing with its rider important ques- 
tions of make and merit of machines, or the 
respective advantages of single and double 
tubes for tires, or the best means of inflict- 
ing punishment on the pestilent curs who, 
on the country roads, bark and snap about 
your pedals. All the loquacity that is in you 
becomes actively developed, and you chat 
unreservedly with the farmer 
hoeing his corn, or the keeper 
of the country grocery where 
you stop to buy a bad cigar. 
You feel a certain benevo- 
lent superiority to the pedes- 
trians whom you meet upon 
the road, and as for horses you regard them 
as but poor creatures ; knowing, as you do, 
that on your machine you may make your 
fifty or sixty miles a day for an indefinite 
period, — a thing utterly impossible to a 
horse, — and that your steed of steel will 
never tire, or stumble, or kick, or balk, or 
run away. 




28 PLEASURE-CYCLING. • 

After all, it is vain to attempt to explain 
to the uninitiated the delight which the 
gratification of what has aptly been called 
the " bicycle passion " brings to its vota- 
ries. It is a delight that grows with time 
and practice, and never wearies. To the 
healthy mind and body, it brings a fresh 
sense of power and the never failing joy of 
motion ; to the lover of natural beauty, a 
closer fellowship with the trees and the 
flowers, and the glory of the hills and sea. 
Perhaps it has not been more exquisitely 
expressed than in these verses of Eben E. 
Eexford. 

" It 's a joy to be up in the morning when the dew is 

still on the clover, 
When the air is full of sweetness that seems like a 

draught divine, 
To mount one's wheel and go flying away, away 

like a rover 
In the wide, bright world of beauty, — and all the 

world is mine ! 

"I sing in my care-free gladness, I am kin to the 
wind that 's blowing, 
I am thrilled with the bliss of motion like a bird 
that skims the down ; 



THE POETRY OF MOTION. 



29 



I feel the blood of a gypsy in my pulses coming 

going, — 
Give me my wheel for a comrade, and the king 

may keep his crown ! " 




II. 

CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 



' You may talk about your ships of state 

And how they plough the main ; 
You may talk about your big balloons, 

And eke your railroad train ; 
You may jolly up your trottijig horse, 

And speed him till he reel ; 
But when you 're after health and fun 
There ^s nothing like the wheels 

John Henderson Garnsey. 




11. 



It is not the purpose of this 
book to give a detailed history 
of the development of the 
Safety Bicycle of 1895 from the 
"Celeripede" and"Drasine" of 
1816, and the machines called 
" hobby-horses," — in all of 
which the rider sat on a perch 
between the two w^heels and propelled the 
machine by thrusting with his feet against 
through the Lallemant Ye- 

3 




the ground 



34 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

locipede of 1866, to which, it is believed, 
the pedal motion was first applied, and in 
which the essential elements of the modern 
" Safety " first appear. Nor is it worth the 
v/hile to devote space to the " high wheels," 
or "ordinaries," so common ten years ago, 
but which have now nearly disappeared 
from the roads. An exhaustive and accurate 
" History of the Bicycle " may be found in 
Luther H. Porter's " Wheels and Wheeling," ^ 
and to that book the reader who may be 
interested in the subject is referred. 

Neither is it possible to attempt here a 
description in detail of the different bicycles 
now on sale in the English and American 
markets. The illustrated catalogues and 
circulars issued by their respective manufac- 
turers sufficiently and fairly describe the 
details and peculiarities of the different 
wheels, so that an intending purchaser, 
studying and comparing the catalogues, can 
get a very good idea of the characteristics of 
the best known bicycles. 

1 Published by the Boston Wheelman Company, 

1892. . 






SAFETY BICYCLE 


1895. 


1. 


Frame 


9. 


Chain 


2. 


Sprocket- Bracket 


10. 


Eear- Sprocket 


3. 


Sprocket 


11. 


Saddle-Post 


4. 


Pedal-Cranks and Pedals 


12. 


Saddle-Rod 


5. 


Wheels 


13. 


Saddle 


6. 


The Plead 


14. 


Pneumatic Tires 


7. 


Steering-Post 


15. 


Valves 



8. Fork 



16. Step 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 37 

The principal parts, common to most 
models of the safety bicycle/ are : — 

The Frame (1), built from steel tubing, 
and answering to the body of an ordinary 
wheeled vehicle. Frames are built of differ- 
ent heights to suit the reach of different 
riders. At the base of the frame the 

Sprocket-Bracket (2), or crank-bracket, 
carrying a shaft or axle which answers to 
the main shaft in any system of machinery, 
and on which is fixed a 

Sprocket (3), or toothed wheel, and the 

Pedal-Cranks and Pedals (4). 

The Wheels (5), generally twenty-eight 
inches in diameter, the rear beincf the drivinsf, 
and the front the steering wheel. 

The Head (6), consisting of the handle- 
bar and the vertically set tube which 
carries it. This vertical tube slides into 
and is clamped to a tube, which passes 
through the forward tube of the frame, 
called the 

1 See Illustration. There is a line of safety bicycles 
in which the power is transmitted from the crank-bracket 
to the rear axle by means of a rigid shaft and bevelled 
gearing. 



38 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

Steering-Post (7), and makes the top of 
the 

Fork (8), which, being turned with the 
movement of the head, takes the steering- 
wheel with it. 

The Chain (9), which transmits the power 
from the sprocket to the 

Hear Sprocket (10), a smaller toothed 
wheel set on the rear axle of the machine. 

The Saddle-Post (U), or the tube of the 
frame into which slides the 

SADDLE-PtOD (12), or tube, carrying the 

Saddle (13), which is adjustable to any 
convenient height. 

The Pneumatic Tires (14). 

The Valves (15), passing through the 
wheel felloes, by the application of an air- 
pump to which the tires are inflated. 

The Step (16), usually a tubular pro- 
longation of the left hand rear axle nut. 

The double part of the Frame, carrying the 
rear axle bearings, is called the Eear Fork. 

Foot-Eests, or '' Coasters," set upon the 
steering-fork, and Brake- Work, may be 
added ; also Lantern-Clip, Bell, and a Cy- 
clometer to measure distances. 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 39 

The principal devices upon which the 
utility of the modern safety depends are, 
first, the system of gear, and transmission of 
power by the endless chain; secondly, the 
application of the ball-bearing ; and, thirdly, 
the pneumatic tire. 

By the use of the gear and chain, a wheel 
of small diameter, say twenty-eight inches, 
is made the equivalent of a wheel of from 
two to three times its own diameter, such 
as was used in the "high wheels" of ten 
years ago ; although this is effected with 
some comparative loss of power through 
friction and lost motion. 

By suspending the wheel and sprocket 
axles, and the spindles of the loose pedals, 
within circles of steel balls, accurately turned 
and revolving on one another and suitably 
enclosed within cones and cases, the friction 
of the moving parts has been reduced, to 
the great advantage of the durability of the 
machine and ease in propulsion. 

The vibration of the rigid frame of the 
bicycle when running upon ordinary roads, 
almost unendurable in the primitive ma- 
chines, was greatly lessened by the appli- 



40 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

cation of the cushion tire, and is made 
nearly inappreciable by the use of the 
"pneumatic." ^ 

The best mechanical ingenuity and the 
most exquisite technical skill have been 
applied to devisiug and perfecting the parts 
of the modern bicycle ; had not this been 
so, the practical difficulties in transmitting 
power through the complicated and wasteful 
mechanism of the machine could not have 
been overcome, and, like the old velocipedes, 
the cycle would have been but a toy, useless 
for practical road work. 

The initial force which moves the bicycle 
is a foot pressure, or " push," applied to a 
loose pedal set at the end of a crank and 
moving a shaft or axle on which is set a 
toothed wheel called a " sprocket." This is a 
lever movement, in which the pedal-crank is 
the long arm, and the radius of the sprocket 
the shorter arm, the weight here being the 

1 Before the application of the pneumatic tire, various 
devices of spring forks, frames, and saddles were applied 
in conjunction with the cushion tire, to take up vibration; 
and many machines thus equipjjed are still to he seen 
upon the road. 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 41 

force in pounds necessary to move the chain 
and attached gearing; in other words, the 
whole load, plus friction and lost motion. 
The power is then transferred by an endless 
chain (in itself one of the most wasteful 
methods of conveying power) to a smaller 
sprocket-wheel set on the rear axle of the 
machine. Here we have another lever 
action, in which the power is applied to the 
extremity of the short arm of the lever, this 
being the radius of the rear sprocket, while 
the long arm is the radius, or spoke, of the 
rear wheel; the weight being finally lifted 
at the end of the spoke where it meets the 
rim of the wheel. It is evident that this 
weight is equivalent to the force, measured 
in pounds, required to propel the machine, 
and that it is just so much less than the 
force exerted by the rider on the pedal- 
crank as is lost by friction or wasted motion 
suffered in the transmission of power through 
the whole train of mechanism. 

The great strain borne by the long arm in 
the second lever system has been lessened 
by the tangential arrangement of the spokes, 
which is not the least useful of the various 



42 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

devices which have been applied to the 
bicycle manufacture. 

By the application of the ball-bearings 
at the tops respectively of the steering-post 
and fork, the actual work of steering the 
bicycle has been reduced to a niinimun, and 
the durability of the working parts insured. 

The frames of the best modern bicycles 
are built of steel or nickel steel tubing. 
The frame-joints, axles, sprocket-brackets, 
and balls for the bearings, with their cones 
and cases, are made from steel forgings, 
turned down to shape. For the joints, how- 
ever, some manufacturers have adopted the 
" lap " method of joining, in which the ends 
of the tubes are lapped and reinforced, and 
the joint then brazed. 

The problem of more equally dividing the 
load between the front and rear wheel-bear- 
ings of the machine has not yet been solved, 
for reasons which the reader will understand 
if he studies carefully the arrangement of 
parts, — the architectural plan, if it may be so 
called, of his bicycle. Even if it were pos- 
sible to distribute the load equally between 
the two wheels, it is a question whether this 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 43 

would result in any practical advantage, 
since it is evident that, as the burden thrown 
on the forward or steering wheel is increased, 
the friction at the steering-head becomes 
greater, and the machine less sensitive to 
steering. 

Great ingenuity has been applied to the 
perfecting of the bicycle chain. The self- 
oiling or block chain is now used in the best 
machines, each block containing a felt pad, 
which, being properly filled with oil, will 
keep the chain sufficiently lubricated for a 
run of several hundred miles. 

The accomplished wheelman must be a 
bit of a machinist as well. He wall learn 
all he can from books, catalogues, and circu- 
lars, from bicycle agents and manufacturers 
and fellow cyclers ; but most and best from 
carefuily studying his own machine, and from 
trying to keep it always in perfect working 
order. 

The writer, like most wheelmen, may have 
an opinion as to which is the best bicycle in 
the market, but, for obvious reasons, he does 
not intend to obtrude his opinion here. 



44 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

Get that machine which you are con- 
vinced, upon careful inquiry, is the best 
of the high-grade wheels ; and do not, 
if you can help it, let the matter of price 
influence your choice. Money is better in- 
vested in a good wheel in the first place, 
than in repairs or surgeon's bills afterwards. 
Many of what in the trade are called second 
class wheels do good work, but the test of 
these has apparently to be made upon the 
road at the risk of the rider, not in the man- 
ufactory. Thus of two bicycles of a certain 
manufacture, one has done excellent service 
for two seasons and appears still to be in 
fair condition ; the other went to pieces run- 
ning down a moderate declivity a week after 
it had been put upon the road. Another 
machine of a widely advertised make, run- 
ning at an eight-mile rate on a smooth road, 
after a month's satisfactory service, broke 
suddenly at the head, throwing and severely 
injuring its rider. 

Moreover, as between the high grade and 
second class wheels, there is generally in 
favor of the former a distinct advantage in 
greater ease of propulsion and more sensitive 
steering. 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 45 

A bicycle of the best manufacture, prop- 
erly cared for, is not likely to get out of 
order, unless as the result of accident or of 
long use. Others are always in the repair 
shop. [N'othing, unless it be a lame horse, 
or a watch that refuses to run, is more vexa- 
tious to its owner than a wheel that is half 
the time unfit for road use by reason of some 
constitutional infirmity. 

The notion that the " life " of a bicycle is 
ordinarily but one season is altogether wrong. 
A first class wheel, well taken care of, should 
be good for half a dozen seasons' work at 
least, with slight expense for repairs or 
renewal of parts. 

Excellent second-hand machines are often 
to be had which practically will do as good 
service as new ones ; especially wheels which 
their former owners have discarded, after a 
season's use, for the latest pattern. But, 
unless you are able to trust your own judg- 
ment as a mechanic in the choice of a bicycle, 
do not buy a second-hand wheel except of 
the manufacturer of the machine, whose in- 
terest it is not to send out a bicycle which 
has not been carefully overlooked, its worn 



46 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

bearings replaced, and the machine properly 
set up and adjusted. 

Weight of Wheel. 

For road-riding, the machine should be 
adapted to the weight of the rider. If your 
weight is from one hundred and forty to one 
hundred and seventy-five pounds, you may 
be absolutely sure that a wheel weighing 
about thirty pounds will do good and per- 
manent service. A lighter wheel may be 
trusted on asphalt roads or race-tracks. 
This rule assumes that you ride a wheel 
with steel rims. If you use the wood rim, 
or an all wood wheel, you of course get rid 
of more weight. 

The safety bicycle, in the first years of 
its use, weighed from seventy to eighty 
pounds, which weight by the application of 
ingenious devices and improved methods of 
manufacture was gradually reduced, until in 
the season of 1893 we find the standard 
road wheels weighing from thirty to forty 
pounds. The notion has grown that, com- 
paring wheel with wheel, the lighter is ab- 
solutelv the better, and it is obvious that, 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 47 

other things being equal, the lighter wheel 
can be propelled with less expenditure of 
force than the heavier one. The adoption 
of the wood rim and tlie paring down of the 
parts of the machine have at length produced 
the road wheel of 1895, which weighs from 
twenty to twenty-two pounds. 

If you intend to follow the fashions in 
bicycles, as in clothing, that is, if you are to 
buy a new machine each season, you will of 
course test for yourself each new construc- 
tion ; and what follows is not intended so 
much for your benefit as for the information 
of those who intend to stick by their old 
wheels so long as these do satisfactory 
service. 

As to the wearing qualities of the wood 
rim, it is at this writing, January, 1895, too 
soon to speak, and the writer leaves the 
question to the reader as one only to be 
answered by experience, merely remarking 
that, bulk for bulk, steel is stronger than 
any known wood, and that a steel rim, well 
lacquered, will always remain unaffected by 
dampness or weather conditions. But it 
may be considered as demonstrated that a 



48 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

set of the best wood rims, carefully used, 
will stand two seasons' wear at least. The 
advantage in weight to be gained by the 
use of the wood rim is from two to three 
pounds. 

Within certain limits, the importance of 
a greater or less weight in road riding exists 
rather in the imaginations of riders than in 
reality ; as is illustrated in the story of the 
wheelman who stopped on a hard road to 
strip his machine of foot-rests and lantern- 
clip. These he stowed safely in his pocket, 
and, remounting, rode away with renewed 
spirit. After a mile or two, he observed 
complacently, with a sigh of satisfaction, 
that he would not have supposed that so 
small a redaction in weight would relieve 
him so much. 

The rider for speed and the pleasure 
cycler, whether in neck and neck racing or 
to break records, work under wholly different 
conditions. Upon the racer, the slightest 
unfavorable conditions may have the most 
damaging results. His time may be materi- 
ally reduced by a wet or rough track, by a 
head wind, or by half a dozen other circum- 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 49 

stances. He is to exert himself to the limits 
of physicial endurance, and he naturally will 
reduce his impedimenta to the utmost, since 
with him every extra ounce of weight carried 
tells. All superfluous clothing he will cast 
aside, and he may even shave his head. He 
will of course choose the lightest wheel that 
can stand the strain of his work with a 
probability of not breaking down ; and the 
number of wheels that do break down under 
the strain of track or road racing shows that 
sometimes he risks too much. The rider for 
pleasure seeks first in the sport safety, and 
then comfort. Unless upon some very long 
hills, he will not feel the difference between 
a twenty-five and a twenty pound wheel. 
He has to propel the weight of his own body 
plus the weight of his machine, say, gen- 
erally, about one hundred and seventy-five 
pounds, and he will find that a few pounds 
more or less will not appreciably increase or 
diminish the work he has to do. The truth 
of this assertion may be tested by taking 
a twenty-mile run, first without any load, 
and then with a handicap of five pounds. 
You will find that the difference in load has 

4 



50 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

not made the second run appreciably slower 
or more fatiguing than the first. 

It is obvious that the rider never really 
" carries " the weight of the bicycle and its 
load, since the greater part of the weight is 
supported on the ground, and the force 
exerted by the rider is only that necessary 
to propel it. When you walk, pushing your 
bicycle before you, this force is of the slight- 
est, — only a few ounces measured in pounds. 
In the saddle, the propelling force, in other 
words the force necessary to overcome the 
resistance presented by the pedal to the foot, 
is measured by a very few pounds. The 
ratio of increase, as between two machines 
weighing respectively twenty and forty 
pounds, is probably not more than two 
pounds. It follows that, within reasonable 
limits, the ease of propulsion depends more 
in keeping the machine accurately adjusted 
and well cleaned and oiled, than in decreas- 
incf its weight. 

The momentum of a heavy bicycle will 
help it to overcome obstacles which will 
stop or overthrow a lighter machine. Thus, 
where two wheels weighing respectively 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 51 

thirty and twenty pounds were run at a 
slow gait against a curbstone at right an- 
gles, the heavier machine easily made the 
lift of four inches to the level of the side- 
walk, while the lighter wheel was stopped 
short. So the heavier wheel will run more 
smoothly, and consequently with less jolting, 
over a rough road. Upon the whole, if you 
do not ride for speed, and if you have in 
good order a thirty or even a thirty-five 
pound wheel, which does your w^ork with 
ease and satisfies your requirements, you may 
as well stick to it, at least until it wears out. 

Gear. 

By the "gear" of a bicycle is understood 
that application of chain and sprockets by 
which the speed of the rear or driving wheel 
is increased so as to make it the equivalent 
of a wheel of larger diameter. Thus, to say 
that a wheel has a " sixty " gear is to say 
that the rear wheel is the equivalent of a 
wheel of sixty inches in diameter, run with- 
out crear; that is, each revolution of the 
sprocket sends the bicycle a distance equal 
to the circumference of a sixty-inch wheel. 



52 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

The gear of a bicycle may be determined 
as follows. Divide the number of teeth in 
the forward sprocket by the number in the 
rear sprocket/ and multiply the quotient by 
the diameter in inches of the rear wheel. 
Thus, supposing the number of teeth in the 
front sprocket to be seventeen, and in the 
rear sprocket eight, and the diameter of the 
rear wheel to be twenty-eight inches, 

17 -^ 8 = 21 X 28 = 591 

which is the " gear " of the bicycle. Multi- 
plying the gear by the ratio between the 
diameter and the circumference of the 
wheel, 

591 X 3.14= 186.83 inches, or 15.57 feet, 

which is the distance which the bicycle will 
travel for each complete revolution of the 
sprocket. It is evident that, with the above 
gear, for each revolution of the sprocket the 
rear wheel makes 2J revolutions. 

As the distance between the teeth of the 
sprockets is made invariable, so as to fit the 

1 This is of course equivalent to dividing the circum- 
ference of the larger by the circumfei'ence of the smaller 
wheel. 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 



53 



chain whatever the gear, it is evident that, 
the higher the gear, the larger the sprocket, 
the longer its radius, and the greater the force 
to be applied from the pedal to the sprocket- 
bracket. On the other hand, the higher the 
gear, the greater the distance which the 
bicycle will travel at each revolution of the 
sprocket-wheel. 

With the twenty-eight inch rear wheel, 
and the number of teeth in the rear sprocket 
eight, the application of the above formula 
gives the following table of possible gears, and 
the distance which the machine will travel 
with each revolution of the front sprocket 
for each gear respectively : 



15te3th, 


gear 52|-, distance, 164.85 in. 


or 13.75 ft. 


16 " 




56 


' 175.84 in., 


or 14.64 ft. 


17 " 




59i 


186.83 in., 


or 15.57 ft. 


18 " 




63 


197.82 in. 


or 16.48 ft. 


19 " 




66i 


208.81 in. 


or 17.40 ft. 


20 " 




70 


219.80 in. 


or 18.32 ft. 


21 " 




73i 


230.79 in. 


or 19.23 ft. 


22 " 


" 


77 


241.78 in. 


or 20.15 ft. 



It will be observed that the ratio of in- 
crease in nominal gear for each additional 
tooth is 3i, and of increase in distance 



54 



PLEASURE- C YCLING. 



travelled for each revolution 10.99 inches, 
or about 0.92 of a foot. 

It is evident that by increasing the di- 
ameter of the rear sprocket the leverage 
applied to its rim, through the power trans- 
mitted by the chain (see page 41), will be in- 
creased ; but with such increase of diameter, 
the front sprocket must be made correspond- 
ingly larger so as to attain the desired speed, 
thus requiring additional propulsive force to 
be applied at the pedal. As the weight of 
parts has been lessened, it has become pos- 
sible to increase the size of both sprockets 
with a net gain of power in the rear sprocket, 
as also to build the machine with a higher 
absolute gear. With nine teeth instead of 
eight in the rear sprocket, the formulas 
given above will give a different table of 
gears, as thus : 



With 18 teeth front, gear 56. 
'■' 59i 
'' 62|. 
' 654. 



'' 19 " 


" 20 " 


" 21 " 


" 22 " " 


'' 23 " 


" 24 " 


" 25 " 



71|. 
74f. 
77|. 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 55 

111 choosing a gear, much depends upon 
the individual taste and comfort of the rider. 
Use the gear which you find the easiest on 
the road. Judging from his own experi- 
ence, the writer believes that for ordinary 
reading a gear of about 63 is best ; and that 
with a thirty -pound wheel of that gear, with- 
out conscious speeding or extra effort, on a 
long run over ordinarily good and moder- 
ately hilly roads, an average speed of from 
ten to twelve miles an hour may be made. 
It is obvious, on consideration, that the 
higher the gear the greater the difficulty in 
hill climbinc^. 

The " round " gears are now almost exclu- 
sively used. The experiments with an ellip- 
tical sprocket have not proved satisfactory. 

A bicycle with a changeable gear has 
lately been invented ; the device consisting 
of an arrangement of toothed wheels set in 
front of the rear axle, and which may be 
thrown into or out of the chain connection 
by means of a lever within the control of 
the rider. 

Ladies' wheels are not ordinarily geared 
above 59, and the "throw," or length of 



56 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

pedal crank, in these is generally not more 
than six inches. The longer the throw, the 
greater the leverage to be obtained at each 
pedal-stroke, and the higher the lift of the 
foot. Some wheels are fitted with slotted 
cranks, so as to be adjusted for a longer 
or shorter throw. 

Tires. 

As to the merits respectively of the dou- 
ble and single tube tires, each rider must 
form his own conclusions. For his own use, 
the writer prefers a single-tube tire of the 
best make, believing that it is the easiest to 
repair when repairs are needed, and that it 
needs repair or adjustment less frequently 
than the double tire. It cannot " creep " on 
the wheel if properly cemented, and it is 
almost impossible for it to leak about the 
valve, the valve nipple and tube being made 
in one piece. On a bicycle having the sin- 
gle tube tire, which was run nearly two thou- 
sand miles during the season of 1894, there 
was not once occasion to deflate a tire, and 
but some half-dozen times to pump up the 
air tension, this operation in each case not 



CHOOSI^^G A BICYCLE. 57 

consuming five minutes. Observation among 
friends using the same or similar makes of 
machines fitted with double tubes led to the 
conclusion that they experienced much more 
trouble than this, especially from " creeping " 
tires, or leaks about the valves. The writer 
has never met a wheelman using the single 
tire who would willingly abandon it, while 
he has listened to many bitter complaints 
from the owners of " double tubes." ^ It is 
to be observed that there is a great differ- 
ence in the wearing qualities of different 
tires, some in the market being of material 
or workmanship so bad that they will not 
easily resist tearing and puncture. 

Brakes. 

The " spoon " brake, or, indeed, any brake 
which is applied directly to the circumfer- 
ence of the pneumatic tire, is destructive to 

1 It is a noteworthy fact that, in the prospectus for 
1895 of a leading company manufacturing high-grade 
wheels, and which supplies either single or double tube 
tires to suit customers, it is stated that during the first 
part of the season of 1894 the demand for single tubes 
was in the proportion of 40 per cent of the whole number 



58 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

the tire, and should be used only in emer- 
gencies. Many such brakes, if not all, are 
uncertain in their operation, and so not 
trustworthy. Many wheelmen prefer to 
ride without a brake, checking speed by 
the friction of the foot against the tire, in 
" coasting," and at other times trusting en- 
tirely to " back-pedalling " to stop or check 
speed. The " band-brake," first used during 
the season of 1893, is a leather-lined steel 
strap applied to a drum set on the rear axle 
of the bicycle, and connected with the brake- 
handle set on the handle-bar by a train of 
wires and springs. It is invariable in its 
operation, and cannot injure the tire. It 
will stop the wheel shortly on level ground, 
or on a moderate declivity ; like the spoon- 
brake, it will slip on a fast run down a steep 
road, but it may always be relied on to check 
speed on any grade, and, with the help of 
back-pedalling, to stop the wheel in a few 
moments. With a little care in handling 
the machine, so as to avoid bending or 

of orders received by the company ; but that during the 
latter part of the season, this proportion was increased to 
90 per cent. 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 59 

otherwise injuring tlie brake connections, 
it is practically impossible for it to get out 
of order, and it has been found to do as good 
work at the end as at the beginning of the 
season, and this on a machine in constant use. 
Upon the whole, this brake is worth the 
extra weight which it adds to the machine, 
which is hardly to be said of any other 
bicycle brake yet invented. " Eacers " are 
run without brakes, and it is understood 
that these will not appear in most of the 
models of road wheels for the season of 
1895. 

Saddle. 

Use the lightest saddle in which you can 
ride comfortably, this being a matter which 
will be determined only by experience on 
the road. Some riders can endure sitting 
the lightest "scorcher" saddle for a whole 
day without the least discomfort, others will 
find it intolerable even for a short run. If 
you find that you must use a heavy saddle, 
choose one of good length, set on front 
and back springs, like the old standard 
" Columbia oSTo. 10 " (than which no easier 
saddle has ever been made), or, if you are 



60 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

a very lieavy weight, a " Garford," or one 
substantially like it. The " Columbia No. 
10" weighs about four pounds, the "Gar- 
ford " even more, while the lightest scorcher 
saddles (leather) now weigh from fifteen to 
twenty ounces. If your light saddle hurts 
you, discard it at once ; if you persist in 
using it, you may lay the foundation of 
a serious disease. It is a good plan to 
have by you a light and a heavy saddle, 
either of which you may use on occasion. 
Saddles have been invented to be made 
of woven wire, and perhaps of other materi- 
als, including a pneumatic saddle of rubber, 
which the rider may use if he wishes to run 
the risk of its exploding under him ; but at 
present no material seems to be so satisfac- 
tory to most riders as good leather. 

Handle-Bar and Handles. 

As you will not ride with a stoop, you 
will not use the " dropped " handle-bar. 
(Some bicycles are fitted with an adjustable 
handle-bar, which may be adjusted to the 
upright position, or dropped, to suit the 
wishes of the rider.) Use cork handles ; 



CHOOSING A BICYCLE. 61 

these are easier and better than any others, 
and, if they are broken, are easily replaced. 
The height at which the handle-bar should 
be adjusted depends much on the length of 
reach of the rider, and it can only be said 
that the handles should be set at such a height 
that the rider, sitting erect in the saddle, 
can easily grasp them without stooping. 
Generally, it may be said that, with the up- 
right handle-bar, the tip of the handle, on 
the head of the machine being turned, should 
pass about one and a half inches below the 
forward tip, or pommel, of the saddle, if 
this last is rightly adjusted. As to the 
length of the handle-bar, the wTiter prefers 
for his own use one which gives a distance 
in a straight line, measured from tip to tip 
of the handles, of from twenty -two to twenty- 
four inches. 

Pedals. 

Light rubber pedals are the most comfort- 
able, — rat-traps the lightest. "Toe-Clips" 
may be servicable to the racer or time- 
maker, but it is not worth while to use 
them for ordinary reading. 



62 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 



Wheel-Guards. 



The use of these on men's wheels is not 
now common. If you have them, keep them 
at home for use in a possible emergency. 
You will not^ ordinarily, ride in muddy 
weather, and on a dry road they are a use- 
less and weighty encumbrance. Ladies' 
wheels are equipped with both wheel and 
dress guards, the latter covering the chain 
and sprockets. 




III. 

HOW TO EIDE. 



" Some love to roam 
O'er the dark sea foam, 
Where the loild toinds whistle free ; 
But a bright cool day-, 
With a smooth hightmy^ 
And a spin on the wheel for me ! " 

F. M. Holland. 






irT?~ 



3:^^ 




III. 




There are two ways of learning 
to ride a bicycle. You may 
put yourself under the charge 
of an instructor, either in the 
open air or in a riding-school, 
or you may go out alone with 
your machine for a course of more or less 
rough and tumble practice on the road. (It 
is wholly or nearly impossible to learn riding 
on the lady's common "loop-frame" wheel 
without the assistance either of a profes- 
sional instructor or of some practised ama- 
teur rider.) 

In the riding-school, you will first be 
placed in the saddle, and, upheld by the 



66 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

instructor, be made to ride around the track 
until you are able to balance, with an occa- 
sional tumble, and to propel your machine ; 
and you will afterwards be taught, princi- 
pally by practice, to mount and dismount. 

If, on the other hand, you are your own 
teacher, you must learn first to mount your 
wheel, since reaching the saddle is a neces- 
sary preliminary to riding at alL Select a 
smooth bit of ground, slightly inclining, and, 
if you are a bashful person, as secluded as 
possible from public observation, and begin. 
Standing just astride the rear periphery of 
the rear wheel of your bicycle, grasp the 
handles firmly, holding the head of the 
machine at right angles with the frame ; 
the wheel pointing down the hill. Now 
place the ball of your left foot on the step 
of the machine, set your teeth, rise on the 
left foot as nearly to a standing posture as 
you dare, and as your grasp on the handles 
will permit, and let the machine " go." It 
is well to have the handle-bar set rather 
high for this preliminary practice, and the 
saddle low, and the machine should carry a 
brake. You will get many a fall at first, 



HOW TO RIDE. 67 

but will learn in a very few lessons to stand 
on the step and balance in that position 
while your wheel runs fifty or a hundred 
feet ; and when you have learned this, you 
have got a long way. 

When you find that you can mount the 
step and balance there with some confidence 
for a hundred feet run, try for the saddle 
from the step, and for the pedals from the 
saddle. You will fail ignominiously the 
first dozen times, and probably get several 
falls, but your first successful *' mount " will 
be an era in your cycling career, for you will 
have gotten the knack, and your confidence in 
your own ability will rise by many degrees. 
After you are reasonably sure of making a 
successful start and mount, aided by the force 
of gravity, try the start on level ground, but 
you need not make a special business of 
this. You may go out upon the road, taking 
advantage of convenient declivities to get 
a start ; and practise the level start as you 
find opportunity. This is of course made by 
placing the left foot on the step, " hopping " 
with the right foot so as to propel the bicycle 
forward, and then rising on the step. 



68 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

As to balancing in the saddle, you will 
be told, and it is true in fact, that the equi- 
librium of the wheel is to be maintained by 
turning the steering-wheel in the direction 
towards which you are in danger of falling. 
This, at first, seems inexplicable to you, and 
you will persist in trying to save yourself 
by turning the wheel the wrong way. At 
length, in a happy moment the " knack " 
comes to you, and thereafter you balance 
unconsciously ; that is, the movements by 
which you maintain your equilibrium are 
nearly automatic, although none the less 
actual and positive in their effect. 

You w^ll learn to dismount in the first 
place from the left pedal ; but for some little 
time you will probably get off the machine 
" anyhow," without attracting more observa- 
tion than you can help. 

But there cannot be a useful manual of 
elementary instruction in cycling. A few 
hours' patient practice will teach you more 
than all the professors of the art can write. 
So, in what follows, the writer assumes that 
the beginner has learned already to balance 



HOW TO RIDE. 69 

himself in his saddle, to propel bis bicycle 
and in some fashion to mount and dismount. 
But to those readers who have never ridden 
and who contemplate learning to do so, a 
single suggestion may be useful. Do not, 
if you can avoid it, buy a new high-grade 
machine and take it out upon a country road 
for the purpose of learning to ride it. You 
will misuse, and perhaps ruin it. If you are 
within reach of a riding-school, learn there 
at least to balance and ride after you are in 
the saddle. 

Do not be surprised if, on your first out- 
door run, you get badly fatigued a mile out, 
and return home in a bath of perspiration, 
to get up the next morning with a pair of 
lame or stiff legs. You have for the first 
time in your life, perhaps, been really exer- 
cising the pushing muscles, and these need 
time to strengthen and develop. Eide at first 
on smooth and level roads, then take some 
easy ascent ; make a good start for it and 
dismount as soon as you find that jo\x can- 
not keep the wheel from wobbling. Turn 
the machine, run down the hill, stop for a 
good breath, and try it again. You will run 



70 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

farther the second time than the first, and, 
if you are not tired out, farther the third 
time than the second. Attack the same hill 
the next day, and the chances are that you 
will conquer it — if it is not too long. Do 
not get impatient : you will not easil}^ get 
discouraged, for you will find something in 
wheeling, even in the learning of it, which 
increases the neophyte's grit, and makes him 
persevere. The writer has never known a 
person attempting to learn riding who has 
failed, in a longer or shorter time, to succeed. 

After you have learned to ride with some 
pleasure and confidence, you may find the 
suggestions that follow, as to the manage- 
ment of your machine, of use. 

Most beginners are disposed to ride with a 
low saddle, and with this pushed back as far 
as the saddle-rod Avill permit. Thus, the 
push upon the pedal is too much in a diago- 
nal direction forward and downward, with 
the result of a loss of power in propulsion, 
and of speedily producing fatigue in the 
muscles of the inside of the leg just above 
the knee, and at the ankle-joint. It is 



no IV TO RIDE. 71 

obvious that the most powerful and easiest 
" push " is to be obtained by a motion of the 
leg and foot nearly vertical; and with the 
foot kept bent downward from the ankle, as 
in the swimming stroke, rather than at an 
upward bend, or horizontal with the ankle 
bone. The rider using the faulty tread de- 
scribed is like a swimmer who should keep 
his body bent at the hips at an angle of 
several degrees, and abridge each of his 
strokes by an inch or two. The saddle 
should be raised so high that, at the full 
stroke of the leg, with the foot bent down- 
ward as described, the forward part of the 
foot will just rest easily and firmly on the 
pedal. As a rough rule, it may be said that 
the saddle should be so adjusted that the 
point of the cantle will be in a horizontal 
line w4th the top of the rider's hip bone, as 
he stands beside it. At the same time, the 
saddle should be brought forward so far that 
the '' push " of the foot will be nearly ver- 
tical, instead of diagonal ; and, with the leg 
extended, the heel should just rest easily on 
the pedal at its lowest point of revolution. 
In those saddles which are set on a tilting- 



72 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

bracket, some small advantage may be 
gained by tilting the saddle forward, but too 
much tilt will render the seat uncomfortable. 
Another advantage of setting the saddle well 
forward is that by so doing the weight of the 
load is more equally distributed between the 
two wheels of the bicycle, — an advantage in 
riding which is recognized by those wheel- 
men wdio ride with a stoop. 

With the L rod, or tubular seat-rod now 
commonly used, (the " goose-neck," or curved 
spring-rod, seems to have had its day,) it is 
not possible to push the saddle so far forward 
as to secure an absolutely vertical push on 
the pedals. And if this were possible, it 
would not be desirable. It is evident that, 
if the push is directly vertical, there will 
be a total loss of pushing power whenever 
the pedal-cranks come to the direct vertical 
position ; that is, there will be two " dead- 
points " for each complete revolution of the 
sprocket. On level ground, the momentum of 
the moving machine will carry it over these, 
and the momentary loss of power will not be 
noticed by the rider. But in hill-climbing 
momentum no longer aids the wheel, and in 



HO IV TO RIDE, 73 

fact it becomes a retarding force to drag the 
machine backwards, and then the " dead- 
points " become very much in evidence, and 
will be sure to stop tlie bicycle if the hill is 
long enough. On the other hand, with a 
push ever so little out of the vertical, there 
can never be an absolute loss of power. 

When you have once determined the best 
adjustment for your saddle, it is a good plan 
to indicate it on the saddle rod by making 
some light scratches with a file, so that you 
need not lose time in getting the correct 
adjustment after you have removed the sad- 
dle for any purpose. 

Push hard on the downward moviuof 
pedal, and let your foot yield to the upward 
movement ; otherwise, you are making one 
foot undo the work of the other. The re- 
verse of this motion, that is, the push on the 
upward moving pedal, with a release of force 
on the downward movement, constitutes 
" back-pedalling " ; an important, and, if you 
ride without a brake, the only means of 
stopping the machine quickly. 

Let your foot always cling to, or " hug," 



74 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

the treadle, keeping the foot beut downward 
as described both on the downward push and 
on the return, unless when '' back-pedalling." 
As to the handle-bar, it should be so ad- 
justed that, sitting in the manner described, 
you can just easily grasp it. 

I assume that you ride for pleasure, not 
to make records, nor to see what measure of 
muscular effort you are capable of. If you 
ride for pleasure, you will stop when you 
are fatigued, walk when walking is easier 
than riding, ride slowly or fast as you feel 
disposed, coast or not when opportunity 
offers. If your ambition is merely to make 
a certain number of miles in a certain num- 
ber of minutes, believe me you are losing 
the best of a noble exercise. 

If you would ride easily, gracefully, and 
with the best results as regards your health 
and comfort, avoid the " stoop " in ordinary 
road riding. 

Says a well known gymnasium instructor : 
" Why will so many of you sit on your seats 
like monkeys on a stick, and try to grind 
your noses off on your front wheel ? All 




HOW TO RIDE. 75 

this is wrong, and will only bring discredit 
on the sport that we love so much. There 
could no occasion arise that 
would necessitate your sit- 
ting on your seat with your 
back humped up like a 
camel. If the wind is blow- 
ing strong and you must ride faster for a 
time, you should bend your body forward 
at the waist, carry your head well forward 
and down, yet keep your back straight and 
chest out. In this way you will not cut 
such a ridiculous figure, and deep breathing 
will not be interfered with." ^ It is pleasant 
to know that the " stoop fad," which appar- 
ently reached its height in the season of 
1893, seems to be rapidly dying out. 

Keep an erect position, like that which 
a graceful equestrian maintains in his sad- 
dle. Sit easily, letting the line of centre of 
gravity of your body fall a hair's breadth to 
the front of the saddle centre. Grasp the 
handles very lightly ; you will soon learn that 
a slight pressure of the hands, just at the 

1 Robert J. Roberts, Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion, Boston. 



76 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

base of the fingers, on the handles of the 
machine, is sufficient. After you have ridden 
for a month or two, and so have acquired 
some confidence, learn to steer with either 
hand, leaving the other at liberty. 

On nothing so much does the pleasure 
of riding depend as on your keeping all the 
muscles of your body relaxed, except, of 
course, the propelling muscles of the legs. 
You will understand this, if, when riding 
with a rigid grasp of the handle-bar, with 
your teeth grimly set and your back stif- 
fened, you happen to remember that you 
are riding wrongly, and let your muscles 
relax. The relief will be instantaneous and 
marvellous. 

Learn to keep the handle-bar steady ; 
thus you will describe a straight track, and 
not a zigzag. If you watch the tracks made 
by other machines on the road, you will ob- 
serve that many of them run a more or less 
crooked course ; that is, the riders of them 
are unable to steer straight. The knack of 
straight steering is wholly in the proper 
management of the hands and arms. If 



HOW TO RIDE. 77 

you will let your hands rest half open on 
the handles, never grasping these hard, and 
so permit the whole weight of the arms to 
depend from the wrists, you will avoid all 
involuntary motions of the shoulders or 
elbow-joints ; and it is these involuntary 
movements that produce wild steering. Sit- 
ting in this way, a slight movement of the 
body to right or left will take the corre- 
sponding handle with it, and thus you will 
steer by the body motion, and not from the 
wrists. 

Learn to dismount by either pedal ; then, 
by reversing the motion of mounting ; that 
is, by a slight bound backward from the step, 
keeping a good grip on the handle-bar. 

It is one thing to scram- 
ble, more or less awkwardly, 
into one's saddle, after an 
exhibition of ungraceful 
" hopping " along the ground, 
and another to vault quietly 
and surely to one's place, and easily catch the 
pedals. Ease and skill in mounting and dis- 
mounting show the accomplished rider, and 




78 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

it is worth while to practise these assiduously 
in private. Do not be in too much haste to 
catch the pedals. If the wheel has impetus 
enough for a good start, you will have plenty 
of time to adjust your feet to the pedals 
gracefully, without fidgeting and paddling 
about in search of them. 

The following rules for mounting and 
dismounting, as, given substantially in Gen- 
eral Ord way's " Cycle-Infantry Drill Eegula- 
tions," are worth keeping in mind : — 

^^ To mount. Grasp the left steering-handle 
with the left hand ; raise the rear wheel slightly 
from the ground with the right hand ; adjust the 
pedals to a horizontal position with the left foot ; 
lower the rear wheel, and, grasping both handles, 
step to the rear of the bicycle ; place the right 
foot on the ground and the left foot on the step. 
Take three short steps forward with the right 
foot and rise on the left foot ; let the body come 
gently into the saddle, and place the feet on the 
pedals. 

'' Or, after having adjusted the pedal cranks, 
step to the left side of the machine, facing front, 
and place the left foot on the step, the left leg 
crossing the right. Push forward on the steer- 



HO IV TO RIDE. 79 

ing-handle ; rise on the left foot ; pass the right 
leg with knee bent, over the rear wheel ; let the 
body come gently into the saddle, and find the 
pedals. 

"To dismount, rise from the saddle on the 
pedals, throwing the weight of the body on the 
left foot ; pass the right leg, knee bent, over 
the rear wheel ; descend lightly to the ground, 
removing the left foot from the pedal." 

" To dismount by the step, carry the left foot 
to the step, rise from the saddle on the left foot, 
and seek the ground with the right foot, at the 
same time checking the machine." ^ 

For a lady's mount and dismount the fol- 
lowing directions may be studied. 

Standing at the left of the machine, ad- 
vance it until the right pedal begins to de- 
scend. Then step into the space before the 
saddle, place the right foot on the right 
pedal, give a slight push on the ground 
with the left foot, and rising on the right 
foot take the saddle, and without haste 
find the left pedal The weight of the body 
pushes the right pedal ' down, as you rise 

1 From Lieutenant May's Cyclists' Drill Regulations, 
U. S. Army. 



80 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

upon it, and gives the bicycle an impulse, 
and the left pedal rises to the place for its 
push. 

To dismount, slacken speed with the brake 
or by back-pedalling, and when the left 
pedal reaches its lowest position rise on it, 
and, keeping a steady hold on the handles, 
swing the body out and step off the pedal; 
or, passing the right foot over the left, take 
a slight hop to the ground. 

In any form of dismount from the pedal, 
be careful to take it at its lowest point, or 
just as it begins to rise. If you rise on 
the back downward movement, you will add 
a sudden impulse to the machine and may 
have to jump quickly to save yourself. 

General Ordway thus describes the posi- 
tion of the mounted cycler : — 

" Head erect and square to the front. 

" Chin shghtly drawn in. 

" Shouklers square to the front. 

"Back straight, with body shghtly inchned 
forward. 

''Arms straight, but not rigid, 

'' Legs straight, but stretched by their weight 
alone. 



HOW TO RIDE. 81 

" Feet parallel to the axis of the cycle, the ball 
of the foot resting lightly on the pedal." 

You will, where the ground permits, wheel 
to the left, for a full turn ; but you should 
learn to wheel either way with confidence. 
When wheeling for a turn, choose level 
ground if possible, as the bicycle is more 
apt to slip when turning on a declivity, than 
in forward riding. On the turn, always push 
hard, particularly on the inward pedal, and 
let a strong push accompany each inward 
shift of the handle-bar when making a short 
turn. If in making a short turn you lose 
your confidence in your ability to make it, 
you will probably go down. 

Some teachers of cycling will tell you 
that the machine is to be steered only by 
the manipulation of the forward wheel; 
others, that it is to be done by the motion 
of the body. In a sense, both statements are 
correct. The first seems obviously true, since 
without the turn of the forward wheel you 
cannot deviate from the straight line. But 
if you will steer, not by a motion from the 
6 



82 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

wrist, but by slightly swaying the body in 
the saddle, you will find that the wheel 
answers almost automatically to your move- 
ments, the arm and wrist following the 
movement of the body. And a certain, al- 
though unconscious, motion of the body is 
as necessary to the cycler, in order to keep 
an easy balance in the saddle, as to the 
equestrian. You will discover this if you 
attempt to make a short wheel keeping the 
body in an absolutely erect position. In 
good riding, first comes the ^' knack " of 
balancing, then, with more or less practice, 
confidence, until at length you ride, steer, 
and wheel almost automatically, and will 
find it the hardest thing in the world to tell 
another how you do it. 

At this point in your experience, your 
confidence in your bicycle will have become 
perfect. You will as soon expect the arm- 
chair by your fireside to rise up in revolt 
and cast you from its embrace, as your wheel 
to play you a trick, or to refuse to answer as 
if by intuition to your slightest half-formed 
wish. And the bicycle will answer your 




HOW TO RIDE. 83 

confidence so long as you keep it going. 
" Hear now/' says Eev. Charles F. Dole, " the 
parable of the bicycle. The 
thing goes as long as you keep 
up the motion. It goes by go- 
ing. Once stop working, once 
begin to let it wobble, and ruin 
faces you. A certain degree 
of momentum is needful. So 
everywhere, if you want to 
succeed, or even to live, you must keep up 
your momentum." 

But there is more in steering than is 
acquired by the proper management of 
hands, body, and arms. You will have 
noticed, as has been said, that, in short 
wheels, you are aided by pushing strongly 
on the inner pedal. The reason for this it 
will puzzle the beginner to discover, but it 
is really an application of " foot-steering." 
If you lash or clamp the steering-fork of 
your bicycle so that it cannot turn, having 
the wheels in a right line, mount and start 
as usual, and then, letting go of the handles, 
fold your hands and push, you will, if the 



84 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

machine is in right balance, move on a 
straight line forward just so long, and no 
longer, as you exert an equal pedal pressure 
with each foot. The stronger push, usually 
that with the left foot, will drag the machine 
towards the left, just as an oarsman drags 
the bow of his boat about with his stronger 
arm, and you will probably overturn in that 
direction. But you will have learned that 
the machine may be guided by the foot 
movement, and you will unlash your steering- 
head and go out on the road with that notion 
in mind. Now bend your energies, say 
during the first fifteen minutes of each run, 
towards acquiring equal pushing power with 
each foot. If you find the right foot the 
weaker, practise wheeling to the right, push- 
ing as hard as you can with the weaker foot. 
From time to time let go the handles, on a 
straight level course, and await results, trying 
to push as evenly as possible. After many 
failures, the time will come when you will 
move straight on without a flinch, and you 
will have begun to acquire the art of riding 
" hands off." You will perfect yourself in 
this by occasional practice on good ground, 



HOW TO RIDE. 85 

and at length, by increasing pressure on one 
pedal or the other, you will deflect the 
course of your wheel to that side, — and 
this is "foot-steering." It, of course, can 
never be as reliable as body-steering, and it 
can be safely practised only on fairly good 
ground ; but there are emergencies in which 
it is convenient to have the hands at liberty ; 
and you will not rest until you have mas- 
tered all the qualifications which go to make 
up a good rider. 

While the stoop is to be avoided upon 
reasonably level ground, a leaning position 
has obviously its place in hill-climbing. 
This will be evident when it is considered 
that in mounting a hill the centre of grav- 
ity of the load is necessarily thrown back 
towards the axle of the rear wheel, thus 
increasing the difficulty of propulsion. To 
counteract this, it is as natural for the rider 
to lean forward as it is for the pedestrian 
walking up a steep hill. At the same time, 
you will as naturally keep a somewhat 
firmer grasp than usual of your handle-bar, 
both to support yourself and to prevent the 



86 PLEASURE- C YCLING. 

forward wheel from wobbling, which it will 
have a tendency to do if relieved from part 
of its ordinary load. At times, you will 
brace yourself by a strong upward pull on 
the handle-bar. As you will naturally lean 
forward in ascending a hill, so you will lean 
backward in running down a steep declivity. 
The elements of success in hill-climbing 
are, first, good legs and lungs, secondly, knack, 
and, thirdly, confidence. 
Each rider must be a law 
to himself as to the way 
in which he will attack 
his hills. Some take a 
strong spurt at the foot of 
the hill and depend on it 
to carry them up ; others work themselves 
up at a slow pace by sheer strength of leg 
muscle. You will find that mounting the 
same hill grows easier and easier the oftener 
it is done, and that a " new " hill will often 
get the better of you, although in fact you 
have again and again ridden easily up harder 
hills. You will of course gain something by 
" zigzagging " a very steep ascent. 

The actual muscular effort necessary to 




HOW TO RIDE. 87 

ascend an acclivity on a bicycle is certainly 
not greater than that required in walking up 
the same hill, and the expenditure of breath 
is less. The difference is (and this makes 
the difficulty in hill-climbing) that, when 
walking, you may stop for rest when you 
choose, whereas on your wheel, working up 
a steep hill, if you stop you may be unable 
to get a new start, and so may be forced to 
w^alk to the top of the hill. 

If a hill distresses you, do not be ashamed 
to dismount and walk. You are riding for 
pleasure, not to make a record. With each 
week of riding, you wdll find the w^ork easier, 
and will smile to think how many a " Hill 
Difficulty " which appalled you in the be- 
ginning has seemed to level itself before 
your flying wheel. But there are many 
steep and stony or sandy hills up which you 
should never attempt to force either yourself 
or your machine. A high-grade bicycle is a 
wonderfully strong and trusty machine for 
its weight, but it was built to be used only 
by reasonable beings ; and if you are a good 
and well practised rider, you may be sure 
that you should never drive your machine 



88 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

across ground to get over which distresses 
yourself. (I do not refer to very long hills, 
on good roads, where of course the endurance 
of the machine will outlast that of its rider.) 
A twenty-eight inch wheel, running at a 
ten-mile gait, makes 7,240 revolutions per 
hour, 120| revolutions per minute, or 2.01 
revolutions each second. Supposing the 
weight sustained by the two axle bearings 
to be 165 pounds, this is distributed be- 
tween the two bearings in about the ratio 
of one third and two thirds,^ the rear axle 
carrying the greater weight, that is, 110 
pounds, and the front axle 55 pounds. 
The proportion of weight sustained by the 
rear axle is of course increased in hill- 
climbing. The strain which the rear bear- 
ing and spokes have to stand is obviously 
very great, even in level roading. Not only 
do the bearings carry weight in the propor- 
tion stated, but the motive power is applied 
to the machine, not by a front traction, as in 
a vehicle drawn by a horse, but directly to 

1 This assumes that the saddle is carried well forward. 
As it is pushed backward, the proportionate weight im- 
posed on the rear bearing is of course increased. 



HOW TO RIDE. 89 

the axle of the wheel ; so that each spoke 
becomes the long arm of a lever of which 
the radius of the rear sprocket is the short 
arm, at the end of which the power is ap- 
plied to raise the weight, that is, the load 
made up of the machine and its rider. It is 
to throw the strain of the lift as much as 
possible into a straight pull lengthwise 
through the spoke, that the admirable tan- 
gential arrangement of the spokes has been 
devised, and applied to all the high-grade 
machines. On a level road the momentum 
of the moving machine helps the wheel; 
but on an acclivity the wheel has both to 
carry its load and to overcome the force 
of gravity which drags it backward. It is 
no wonder that spokes in sound wheels have 
been known to snap like twigs at the felloes 
under the weight of a heavy rider driving 
his machine up a hard hill, and that such 
accidents are not more common shows the 
perfection to which the bicycle manufacture 
has attained. 

You will be told at the riding-schools to 
look always straight ahead in riding, and 



90 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

never at the road in front of your wheel. 
This advice is sound, theoretically, but it is 
not always possible to follow it on ordinary 
country roads. Sharp stones, little ruts, sand 
or water holes, bits of broken glass, lie every- 
where in wait for you, and you will learn 
with practice to avoid them almost instinct- 
ively, by a turn of the hand. While in the 
beginning, if you fixed your eyes on a peb- 
ble ahead of you, you would be sure, by 
the force of some mysterious attraction, to 
run your wheel over it, soon you will be 
able to graze it by a hair's breadth on 
either hand without touching it. Keep 
then an easy outlook upon the road about 
thirty feet in front of you ; and still farther 
ahead if you are riding a bad road, over 
which you have to pick a path for your 
wheel. Avoid watching your front wheel. 
It will take care of itself, and watching it 
will tend to make you giddy or confused. 

If you do not carry a brake, do not at- 
tempt coasting until you have acquired the 
fullest confidence in yourself and thorough 
control over your machine. Without the 



HOW TO RIDE. 91 

brake, the only means of checking speed is 
by braking with the foot, which is an inef- 
fectual resource, besides being injurious to 
the tires ; or back-pedalling, to make which 
effective on a steep grade requires great mus- 
cular effort. In coasting, not only have you 
to look out for possible collisions, but the 
frame of a light weight machine cannot be 
put to a severer test than it suffers in a run, 
say at a twenty-mile gait, down a long hill. 
The best place for the feet of the ordinary 
rider, in his first season, is on his pedals ; 
and the worst cycling accidents recorded 
have occurred to riders coasting without 
brakes, or in the night. 

To check speed in coasting, do not apply 
the brake too suddenly, if you would avoid 
a bad " header." If you have a band-brake, 
apply it gradually, let go of it, and in a 
second apply it again. You may use the 
same method with the spoon-brake, if it 
works well and freely. 

The night rider takes the risk of accidents 
from bad roads, or obstructions which may 
cut his tires or otherwise injure his machine 



92 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

or himself. But there is no den}dng the 
strange fascination of night-riding. As you 
swoop through the darkness lil^e a hawk, 
unable to see the slight possible dangers 
that lie in wait for your wheel, and so per- 
force relieved of all responsibility for your 
own safety, you experience an eerie sensa- 
tion which must be akin to that which the 
old New England witch enjoyed, as she 
sped on her broomstick through the cloudy 
night to a symposium of the " black man's " 
disciples. 

On dark nights, always carry a lantern. 

Observe carefully the " law of the road " ; 
that is, on meeting a carriage or another 
wheelman keep to the right ; in passing, to 
the left. If you will do this, even although 
it may not be absolutely necessary, you will 
avoid the responsibility of accidents. If you 
ride in the dark, ring the bell freely. 

After much conflict, it may now be consid- 
ered as settled law throughout the United 
States that the bicycle is a " vehicle," and that 
its rider is possessed of the same rights and 
charged with the same duties, so far as these 



HOW TO RIDE. 93 

are applicable to him, as the driver of any 
other vehicle. In the summer of 1894, the 
Legislature of Massachusetts passed, and the 
Governor of the State approved, June 14, an 
" Act to regulate the use of Bicycles and other 
similar vehicles," it beinsr understood that 
the act had the approval of the League of 
American Wheelmen. By the terms of the 
fifth section of the act, it was taken out 
of the power of local boards, such as the 
street commissioners of towns and cities, 
to prohibit the use of the wheel in the pub- 
lic thoroughfares, — a power which had at 
times been harshly, not to say unjustly used. 
As the Massachusetts act may probably be 
made the foundation of similar acts in other 
States, it is printed below in full, for the in- 
formation of cyclers in Massachusetts and 
elsewhere.! 

i Chapter 479 of the Acts of 1894 : — 

" Section" 1. Whoever, without the permit provided 
for in section three of this act, rides in a public highway 
or town way, street, square, or park a bicycle or tricycle 
at a rate of speed exceeding ten miles an hour, or rides 
such machine on a sidewalk, or rides such machine in 
the streets, squares, or parks of any city when the same is 
not provided with a suitable alarm bell adapted for use 



94 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

It is a pretty custom, on meeting another 
wheelman, to ring him a salute on your bell. 

by the rider, or after sunset rides the same in any public 
way, square, or park, whether within or without the 
limits of a city, when such machine is not provided with 
such suitable alarm bell, shall be punished by fine not 
exceeding twenty dollars for each offence, and shall be 
further liable for all damages occasioned to any person by 
such unlawful act. 

"Section 2. The term 'sidewalk,' as used in this 
act, shall mean any sidewalk laid out as such by a city, 
town, or fire district, and any walk in a city or village 
which is reserved by custom for the use of pedestrians, 
or which has been specially prepared for their use. It 
shall not include cross-walks, nor shall it include foot- 
paths on portions of public ways lying outside of the 
thickly settled parts of cities and towns which are worn 
only by travel and are not improved by such cities or 
towns or by abutters. The terms ' bicycle,' and ' tri- 
cycle,' as used in this act, shall be deemed to include all 
vehicles propelled by the person riding the same by foot 
or hand power. The terms ' park,' and ' square,' as used 
in this act, shall not include any spaces under the con- 
trol of park commissioners, or of a park board or a special 
park department of a town or city having power to make 
regulations relative to such spaces, and this act shall not 
in any way abridge the powers of such commissioners, 
board, or department. 

" Section 3. The mayor of a city or selectmen of a 
town may in their discretion, upon any special occasion, 
grant permits to any person or persons to ride such 



HOW TO RIDE. 95 

If in rapid roading you are confronted by 
a sudden danger, you must decide on the 
instant how you will meet it, — if you hesi- 

machines, during a specified time, upon specified por- 
tions of the public ways of such city or town, at any rate 
of speed ; and may annex such other reasonable condi- 
tions to such permits as they shall deem proper. The 
city council of a city and the selectmen of a town may 
also, under such conditions as they deem proper, permit 
the use of velocipedes or other similar machines by 
children on any sidewalk in any public way, square, or 
park in such city or town. 

" Section 4. Proceedings for the enforcement of the 
penalties imposed by this act shall be instituted within 
sixty days from the time the off"ence is committed. 

" Section 5. No city or town shall have any power to 
make any ordinance, by-law, or regulation respecting the 
use of bicycles or tricycles, except as provided in section 
three of this act ; and, except as provided in said section 
three, no ordinance, by-law, or regulation heretofore or 
hereafter made by a city or town in respect to bicycles or 
tricycles shall have any force or effect." 

The " Liberty Bill," so called, enacted by the Legisla- 
ture of New York in June, 1887, and which has been 
substantially re-enacted in several other States, provided 
that ' ' commissioners, trustees, or other authorities hav- 
ing charge or control of the highways or park drive- 
ways " of Central Park, " shall have no power or authority 
to pass, enforce, or maintain any ordinance, rule, or 
regulation by which any person using a bicycle or tri- 



96 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

tate, you are lost. If you believe you can 
stop in season to avoid it, you will of course 
do so ; but if you cannot stop, do not slacken 
speed except in the case that you have to 
avoid an impact with some solid obstacle. 
A fast wheel will skim through, sometimes 
almost on a plank's edge, where a slow one 
will go down. If you have a narrow passage 
which you must make, do not think how 
narrow it is, but rather how much room it 
affords. Sight for the middle line of it, keep 
cool and steer straight and push hard, and 
ten chances to one you will be all right. If 
you hesitate and let the bicycle lose speed 
and wobble, you will certainly come to 
grief. 

In setting out for a ride, see always that 
the nuts about the saddle connections and at 
the axle-hubs are tight, and that the head is 
firmly clamped to the fork. If, on the road, 
the saddle begins to slip under you, check 
speed, andj if necessary, rise on the pedals, 

cycle shall be excluded or prohibited from the free use of 
any of the park highways or driveways at any time when 
the same is open to the free use of persons using other 
pleasure carriages." 



HOW TO RIDE. 97 

keeping a firm grip on the handles. If the 
head turns in the tube while you are riding 
at a good pace, you will get a fall so quickly 
that you will not know what throws you. 
Bicycle falls seldom result seriously, but if 
you find that you must fall, say to the right, 
throw the right foot off the pedal, keep a 
good grip on the handles, and the chances 
are that you and your machine will come up 
standing. If you run nearly at right angles 
against some solid obstacle, check speed as 
much as you can, and dismount by the step 
just as you strike. If you keep the saddle, 
you may be thrown forward. 

If you have ruts or street-car tracks to 
cross, take them as nearly at right angles 
as possible. If you swerve so as to let 
your wheels fall into the rut or track, you 
probably will get a bad fall. So if you are 
riding on a badly rutted road, you may have 
to save yourself by zigzagging from one side 
of it to the other. 

A very short experience upon the road 

will teach you that a strong wind, if against 

you, makes hard work of wheeling, while 

if it is at your back it equally lessens 

7 



98 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

the labor of propulsion. Your dress should 
afford as little vantage for the wind as 
possible, if you would ride easily. So you 
will wear a cap instead of a hat, and, in a 
windy day, keep your coat closely buttoned. 
Among the other disadvantages of the long 
skirt for ladies is that it catches the wind 
so readily. 

The greatest annoyance which besets the 
cycler on the road is from the attacks of 
ill bred dogs, who snap about his pedals 
and may dart under his wheel and so throw 
him. This is most likely to happen on back 
country roads where the inhabitant curs 
are unused to the sight of the wheel. If 
you are attacked by a dog on a road com- 
monly frequented by wheelmen, you may be 
sure that the animal is vicious and deserves 
to be put out of the way. If you are at- 
tacked running down hill, throw your feet 
on to the coasters. There will be a happy 
chance that the pedal will strike the cur 
on the head, and perhaps, as has once hap- 
pened within the knowledge of the writer, 
fracture his skull. If you can make a fly- 



HOW TO RIDE. 99 

iug shot, and are attacked while on the 
wheel by a vicious dog, intent on biting, 
shoot him, — the law will justify you. 

Not so dangerous as the dogs, but nearly as 
annoying, are the flocks of hens or turkeys 
which, when frightened by your approach, 
invariably run in front of your wheel utter- 
ing discordant cries and gobbles. But these 
neither bark nor bite, and generally manage 
just to escape being run down. 

As regards the form and rate of riding, 
the temperament of the rider counts as a 
most important factor. A graceful walker 
will be a graceful rider, and a rider who has 
undergone the military drill will show it 
upon the wheel almost as much as in w^alk- 
ing. A nervous man, as he is sure to be a 
fast walker, will make a rapid rider, and 
will find it hard to keep a pace of less than 
twelve miles an hour in ordinary reading. 
Indeed, in cycling, nerve counts as much as 
muscle, or even more. Most of the riders 
who have made great records on the race- 
track have combined to an unusual degree 
the qualities of alertness, daring, and quick- 



100 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

ness of perception to see and take advantage 
of an instant's opportunity. Study a group 
of their photographs, and you see a set of 
clean-cut alert faces, firm-set mouths, and 
keen eyes. The figures do not show ex- 
cessive muscular development, rather lithe- 
ness and grace. For example, you v/ill not 
find a more beautiful figure in its way than 
that of Zimmerman on his wheel, but it has 
the beauty not so much of a Hercules as 
of the Flying Mercury. 

Thus it is impossible to prescribe for 
any one a '' rate " for road-riding. You 
will find your wheel answer to your feeling 
almost as if it were a part of your own 
nervous system, and your temperament will 
govern your pace. When you are sluggish 
and weary, your wheel will drag under you ; 
as the fresh air and rapid motion enliven you, 
your wheel will seem to feel a new impulse. 
Experience will soon teach you your pace, and 
you will find that, taking one run with an- 
other, you make an average hour rate which 
will not much vary from day to day. 

You will find it hard, particularly if you 
are of a nervous disposition, to conform your 



HOW TO RIDE. 101 

own pace to the different pace of another. 
It is like trying to row behind an oar whose 
style and stroke are different from your own. 
Your tastes and feelings may be perfectly 
congenial, and you may be the best of chums 
off the wheel, but if your companion on the 
road for a long run customarily rides at 
eight miles while you ride at twelve, you 
both will soon grow as restive as a pair of 
ill-matched horses. The result may be to 
develop a certain petulance of temper, 
rather than indulge which you had better 
"agree to differ," and each either take his 
own pace or separate at the first cross- 
roads. 

At the end of the season, if you have 
ridden prudently, and otherwise taken good 
care of yourself, you should be in the best 
possible condition of health and strength ; 
able to take a fifty-mile run without appre- 
ciable fatigue, as your once unaccustomed 
muscles have developed and hardened by 
the season's practice. In the I^orthern 
climate, you will perforce abandon reading 
during the winter, and when you mount the 



102 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

wheel for the first ride the next season, you 
will probably be appalled and discouraged 
to find how much strength you have lost. 
But in a comparatively short time the 
muscles for a time out of use will regain 
their former elasticity and power ; and with 
a couple of weeks' steady riding you will 
regain all you have lost. If you are within 
reacli of a riding-school, be assured that a 
regular practice there during the off season, 
say two or three rides each week of half an 
hour each, will not only bring you pleasure 
in the taking of them, but will count greatly 
to your advantage when you take to the 
road in the spring. 




IV. 
TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE, 



" When Aurora paints the dawn 

A?id the fields are bright with dew, 
When the fieecy mists of morn 

Rise and thin and meltfro?n view, 
what ecstasy to feel, 

With the wind against your face, 
Miles slip by beneath your wheel. 

Cares outdistanced in the race ! " 



L. G. C. 




IV. 



What his piano, his violin, 
his flute, is to the accom- 
plished musician, what his 
locomotive is to the railway 
engineer, his wheel is to the 
enthusiastic cycler. " His 
wheel and he are one. It 
seems to obey his thought 
and to share his emotions. It lives with 
his life, it reflects his idiosyncrasies." It 
seems to him not a lifeless congeries of steel 
and nickel parts, but a thing of intelligence 
answering to his own ; and, if it comes to 
grief, he mourns for it as for a favorite horse 




106 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

or dog. So, if you are really fond of cycling, 
you will take the same pride in a well-kept 
and well-running machine that a horseman 
feels in a well-groomed horse. 

A bicycle frame, with its straight lines 
and sharp angles, is not perhaps a thing 
of beauty, although some of the models of 
1893 and 1894 have a rakishness of design 
which is very nearly graceful ; but it may 
at least have the beauty of cleanliness and 
brightness, and then when it flashes by in 
the sunlight, a glitter of black and silver, it 
will not want admirers. 

Many bicycles, even of the best make, 
become practically worthless by the end of 
their first season of use ; but except in cases 
where the machine has been exposed to some 
severe accident, this is because the rider has 
been too lazy or too ignorant to take care 
of his wheel. If you will spend from five 
to ten minutes at the end of each run in 
caring properly for your bicycle, you will 
find it always ready for use, and, barring 
accidents, as good for road use at the end of 
the season as it was at the beginning. 

The ^vriter lately rode a wheel which for 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. 107 

ease of propulsion and straight steering 
seemed perfect, and which he found had 
been ridden three thousand miles during 
the season of 1894. It was equipped with 
single tube tires which were inflated but 
three times during the season, and the bicy- 
cle, having been carefully and intelligently 
cared for, was to all intents and purposes as 
good as new. 

I assume that you are riding about one 
hundred miles a week in fair weather, and 
over ordinary roads. 

After each run, look over your machine 
carefully. If it shows mud-splashes, wash 
them off with a damp, not dripping sponge. 
If it is dusty, dust lightly with a soft cloth, 
preferably woollen, or with cotton waste. 

Some of the manufacturers advise cleaning 
the bicycle with a hose, saying that water 
will never injure their machine. But no 
one would willingly expose his machine to a 
heavy shower if he could find an opportunity 
to house it, and there is a chance that a 
smart stream of water from a hose will 
strike some bearing which is not fully pro- 



108 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

tected by oil, and so perhaps cause rust. 
It is a safe rule, never, if you can help it, to 
allow water to touch the bearings of your 
machine. 

Wipe all oil and dirt from the outsides of 
the bearings. 

Be sure that the nickel parts are dry, and 
rub them well with a chamois skin. This, 
with a little fine whitino- will remove in- 
cipient rust. 

If you have to keep your machine in a 
place accessible to dust, it is well to keep it 
covered with a cotton cloth. An old sheet 
will answer the purpose. It goes without 
saying that a bicycle should never be kept 
in a damp " stable," esj)ecially if it has any 
wooden parts. 

See that the axles, joints of tubing, and 
outsides of the bearings are always clean 
and bright. If the spokes are nickelled, rub 
them occasionally with a woollen cloth moist- 
ened in kerosene. Keep the chain as clean 
and dry as possible. 

Keep the bearings of your machine snug, 
not tight. If too tight or too loose, they 
will soon wear out. When you shake the 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. 109 

wheel, there should appear only just enough 
lateral motion on the axle to be perceptible. 

If the bearings are in good order, each of 
therOj in running, should give a soft contin- 
uous click. If your machine makes a sharp 
or irregular noise on the road, ascertain at 
once what the matter is. The noise may 
be caused by a dry chain or axle, or by lost 
motion in the brake connections. Listen 
carefully to the working of each bearing, 
and if the noise proceeds from it you will 
conclude that a ball has become broken or 
badly worn. In that case " take down " the 
machine to the bearing, or have this done, 
and have the worn or broken part replaced. 

Some wheelmen are always taking their 
machines to pieces ; but this is not often 
necessary unless a part is broken, or the 
machine has got badly filled up with mud 
or water. In any case, unless you are an 
excellent mechanic, it is better to send your 
wheel to a repair shop when it needs taking 
down. It is a nice job to "■ set up " a bicycle, 
and if there is anything wrong in the adjust- 
ment, the machine will run badly and wear 
out at the bearings. 



110 PLEA SURE- C Y CLING. 

The chain necessarily takes more wear 
than any other part of a bicycle, and should 
always be most carefully looked after. It 
should be kept free from grit and dust, and 
it is well to brush it well with a stiff brush 
after each run. Every two or three months, 
reverse it on the spockets, so as to distribute 
the wear between the two sides. 

Oil your bicycle, generally, once a week, 
using rather a heavy oil and never enough 
of it to run out at the bearings. The rear- 
axle bearing, the bearing at the sprocket- 
bracket, and the lower steering-head bearing 
take the most wear, and are most carefully 
to be looked after. Work each bearing well 
after oiling. 

You will find it very convenient to sling 
up your bicycle to a hook in a ceiling, or to 
tlie limb of a tree, before oiling or cleaning^ 
so that you can get easily at all parts of the 
machine and work the bearings freely. 

Do not let the lubricating oil touch the 
tires of your bicycle, as it is destructive to 
rubber. If kerosene gets on to the tires, wipe 
it off quickly. The coal oil products are, 
more or less, solvents of rubber ; kerosene 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. Ill 

however being a much less powerful solvent 
than benzine, and therefore a safer and 
nearly as effective an agent for cleaning the 
bicycle. 

Clean the machine about once a month, 
rirst, sling it up, as directed above. Loosen 
the bearings slightly, and fill each bearing 
v^ith kerosene from a squirt-can and work the 
bearing rapidly. Do this until the kerosene 
I'uns out clean from the bearing. Take off 
the chain and let it soak for fifteen minutes 
in a liberal bath of kerosene. Shake it out, 
rub the whole surface of each block clean 
with a woollen cloth, and hang the chain up 
to dry out. Eub the sprocket-teeth clean 
with a woollen cloth moistened in kerosene. 

Take advantao-e of the chain beinsj off the 
machine, while the wheel is suspended in the 
uir, to test the bearings and their adjustment. 
Work the pedals, and listen carefully at the 
bearing on each side of the sprocket-bracket. 
If it gives out a soft, regular musical " click," 
it is probably all right. Eevolve each wheel 
and listen at its bearing. The wheel, if the 
bearings are rightly adjusted, should, under a 
smart impulse, revolve for several minutes, 



112 PLEASURE-CYCLING, 

and, in stop^oing, should oscillate backwards 
and forwards, until the weight of the valve- 
nipple brings it to a rest with the nipple 
about at the bottom of the circumference. 
On revolving the sprocket, it should, if 
the bearings are right, come to rest with the 
pedal-cranks standing about in the vertical 
line. 

Place the chain — I assume that you use an 
" Elliott " or other self-oiling block chain — 
on its side on a board or table. Put not more 
than one good drop of oil in each block, be- 
ing careful not to omit a block. If oil ap- 
pears on the outside of the chain, wipe it off 
as cleanly as possible with a woollen cloth. 

If you use dry plumbago for lubricating 
the outside of the chain, apply it on the 
working side of the chain only, with a very 
little kerosene oil, which should not be al- 
lowed to work into the insides of the blocks, 
before replacing the chain. Preparations of 
plumbago, or graphite, are now sold in the 
form of lubricating sticks, using which you 
will apply the lubricant more evenly and 
easily than by the use of dry graphite. Be- 
ware, however, of compounds of grease and 



:r,»<ti 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. 113 

graphite, sold for lubricants, which leave the 
chain sticky, so that it will gather grit and 
wear the sprockets. 

Now replace the chain on the sprockets. 
To do this place the joint ends of the chain, 
respectively, over the upper teeth of the 
sprockets and revolve the sprockets towards 
each other until the ends of the chain meet, 
or nearly so. If you have difficulty in mak- 
ing the joint, as may be the case if the wheel 
is suspended and you are working alone, 
draw the ends of the chain together by 
means of a cord inserted between the block- 
joints until the joint is made ; fasten the 
cord, and then put in the screw and nut to 
fasten the chain. 

Now oil each bearing, using a little more 
oil than common. 

At the end of the season clean the machine 
carefully, oil it well, and sling it up or hang 
it on the " rests " made for the purpose, 
and cover it with a cotton cloth. Put it in 
the dryest and cleanest place you can find 
for the winter. At the beginning of the 
next season, if the machine is not to be 
taken down, clean out the old oil with the 



114 PLEAS URE- C YCLING. 

kerosene, and give it a fresh oiling. It will 
be well to work the bearings occasionally 
during the off season. 

Keep by you the black lacquer sold for the 
purpose of repairing the scratches or worn 
places which are sure to show themselves on 
the enamelled parts of your machine. This 
is not nearly so durable as the enamel, but 
if applied whenever needed it will keep rust 
from the frame and prevent the outfit from 
getting shabby. 

Inflating Tires. 

In inflating a tire, it is of advantage, if 
you have opportunity, to turn the machine 
on its side on supports, or to sling it up, so 
that the wheels can revolve easily. See that 
the air-pump and connecting hose are clean 
and free from dust, and that the closest pos- 
sible connection is kept between the valve 
and pump during inflation. At each stroke 
of the piston, force it as nearly as possible to 
its full length. 

As the greater weight falls upon the rear 
wheel of the bicycle, its tire should be kept 
the most tensely inflated. The degree of 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. 115 

inflation desirable for the pneumatic tire 
varies with the weight of the rider. A tire 
which is hard enough for a rider weighing 
one hundred and fifty pounds will flatten 
badly under one wdio weighs two hundred. 
If your tires flatten very slightly under your 
weight, no harm is done, — your w^heel will 
run with the less jolting, and you will incur 
less risk of injuring the tire on stony ground. 
On the other hand, if the tire flattens too 
much, it may " cut " at the rim of the wheel ; 
and it is probably true that "hard" tires 
propel more easily than " soft " ones. 

If you run a double-tube tire with a too 
soft inflation, you will probably very soon 
destroy the inner tube, which is exceedingly 
fragile and easily injured. 

The larger the tire, the less the degree of 
inflation necessary to keep it safe, and the 
easier the motion of the machine. But with 
the decrease in diameter of the tire, the 
lio'hter the machine becomes. 

Never meddle unnecessarily with the 
valves. The less often these are touched, 
the less likely they are to leak. If, when 
you remove the valve-cap, the valve " whis- 



116 PLEASURE-CYCLING, 

ties/' this shows that some foreign substance 
has got into the piston, or plunger, of the 
valve, — probably from the air-pump. If the 
leak is so slight that you can inflate the tire 
so as to overcome it, do so, and replace the 
valve-cap ; and the obstacle in the valve will 
probably work out of itself. So long as the 
cap holds the air, you need not trouble your- 
self about the interior leak. A little oil ap- 
plied to the washer of the valve-cap, or to 
the threads of the screw-stopper, in the 
valves made without washers, and wiped off 
carefully, will help to keep the valve tight. 

Mending Tires. 

If your tire leaks, first see — if you are not 
aware of having punctured the tire — whether 
the leak is in the valve. Turn the wheel so 
that the valve will come uppermost, and 
hold a glass of water so that the valve-nip- 
ple will be submerged in the water, and 
watch for air bubbles, which will appear if 
the valve leaks. If no bubbles appear, sponge 
the surface of the tire liberally with water, 
and watch closely for bubbles. If none 
are detected, probe carefully the surface of 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. 117 

the tire, wherever any scratch or abrasion ap- 
pears, with the blunt head of a large needle 
or with the instrument provided for the pur- 
pose in the repair outfit. If the leak is not 
detected, remove the wheel from the machine 
and immerse it in a tub of water. Then, if 
the tire does not show bubbles to indicate 
the leak, you have no resource left but to 
send the wheel to the repair shop. 

After a long run, you may find a tire 
wholly or partly deflated without any ap- 
parent cause. In such case, on examination, 
you will find that the valve-cap has worked 
loose, not having been screwed to a firm 
" set " before you started, and that the con- 
stant pressure on the tire on the road has 
forced out the air through the valve-nipple. ■ 

In mending the double-tube tire, the tire 
must be deflated and removed from the 
wheel at the place of the puncture. Then 
the inner tube is to be taken out, or so much 
of it as is necessary, and patched with the 
pure rubber ribbon which makes a part of 
the bicycle outfit and rubber cement (a solu- 
tion of pure rubber and other ingredients in 
benzine), after which the tube and tire are to 



118 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

be replaced, and the tires inflated. Ordi- 
nary punctures in the single-tube tire are 
easily and quickly repaired by inserting in 
the puncture rubber threads in the ordinary 
form of " snappers," or rubbber plugs made 
for the purpose, either of these being well 
covered with the rubber solution and forced 
into the puncture, when the benzine evapo- 
rates and leaves the rubber a solid mass, 
adhering firmly to the tire and making it 
air-tight. 

Temporary repairs on the road may be 
made by patching the punctured place on the 
outside with the rubber ribbon and solution, 
and binding the tire and felloe tightly with 
hemp twine. All the parts to which the 
solution is to be applied must be perfectly 
clean and dry. A piece of sand-paper for 
cleaning the rubber may be a useful part of 
the equipment. 

General Eepairs. 

If your bicycle has a buckled frame, or a 
warped wheel or broken spokes, you had 
better send it to the repair shop, and so if 
the tire wants cementing. But it is well to 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. 119 

understand that spokes may be loosened or 
tightened by turning to right or left the nip- 
ple set on the spoke at the junction with the 
felloe. This may be done with a spanner or 
monkey-wrench, or with a special tool fur- 
nished for the purpose in some outfits. The 
set or " true " of the wheel depends largely 
on the tension of the spokes, and you will 
not meddle with them unnecessarily. 

Try your spokes from time to time, taking 
each in turn around the circumference of the 
T\^eel, to see that none of them have worked 
loose. 

It is said that a buckled or sprung wheel 
may often be restored to shape by laying it 
down and placing the foot on the higher 
part of the bend in the rim, lifting with the 
hands on the lower part, and so springing it 
back ; but this would seem to be an heroic 
remedy, and best let alone. There is little 
danger of a wheel on a high-grade machine 
buckling or springing, unless as the result of 
a severe collision or other accident. 

If you are obliged to cement a tire for 
yourself, place the tire on the wheel, with 
the side to be cemented outward. Sear it 



120 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

slightly all around with a hot iron, so that 
the cement may stick to the rubber; re- 
move the tire ; pour heated cement into 
the felloe and distribute it evenly ; then re- 
place the tire on the felloe, seared side in, 
and, if the wheel-rim is steel, heat the felloe 
from nnderneath with a spirit lamp, (which 
will not injure the enamel finish,) and let 
the cement " set " for several hours. Melt 
your cement over a slow fire, stirring it con- 
stantly so as not to burn it. 

You will find on your machine appli- 
ances by which the tension of the chain may 
be increased or diminished. As the chain 
wears, it v>rill grow slack on the sprockets, 
but a chain well taken care of should run 
well for two seasons without readjusting. 
Too tight a chain causes the wheel to run 
hard, and wears the sprockets ; if too loose, 
there is a loss of power, and a likelihood of 
stretching or breaking the chain on any 
sudden application of power, as in ascend- 
ing a hill. If your chain shows a slack be- 
tween the tops of the sprockets of not more 
than a quarter of an inch, the tension is prob- 
ably right. 



TAKING CARE OF A BICYCLE. 121 

Bending a pedal-crank is the accident like- 
liest to happen to a wheel in the hands of an 
inexperienced rider, and many an old rider 
has had, at one time or another, to work home 
on one pedal. Bent cranks are repaired at 
the shops by putting them under strong 
pressure in a vice. But you may gener- 
ally straighten the crank at home in the 
following manner. Place the bent crank, 
with the convex upward, upon an ordinary 
chopping-block, slightly hollowed, as such 
blocks generally are, by use, so that the 
ends of the crank wdll rest firmly, leaving 
the bent place free of the block. Set a billet 
of oak w^ood endwise on the part of the 
crank where the bend appears, and strike 
one smart blow accurately upon the upper 
end of the billet with a rather heavy 
hammer. If the first blow only partially 
corrects the fault, you may try a second; 
but if the blows appear to make no im- 
pression on the crank desist from further 
attempts, lest you break the crank, and 
send it to the repair shop. 

ISTever let a hammer touch directly any 
part of the machine. If you have a pin to 
drive out, interpose a copper wedge or a 



122 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

bit of oak wood between the hammer and 
the point of the pin. In using the monkey- 
wrench, try to move it directly in the arc 
of which it makes the radius, and so avoid 
bruising the nut or damaging the screw- 
thread. If a nut is set hard, a little kero- 
sene allowed to work into the screw bear- 
ing may relieve it. The little wrenches 
furnished with the bicycle equipment are 
useful, but an ordinary machinist's wrench 
is best for loosening the nuts about the 
saddle and saddle-rod, and the pedals. 

The parts of the leading bicycles are in- 
terchangeable, as between wheels of the 
same model, so that any new part wanted 
can be supplied. It was by carrying such 
duplicate parts as would most likely be 
needed, or by sending these ahead on the 
route, that the trans-continental riders, 
notably Messrs. Allen and Sachtleben in 
their trip across Asia, were able to com- 
plete their arduous journeys. 



V. 

DEESS AND EQUIPMENT. 



" She met me on the river road 
Beyond the pasture bars, 
With toind blown hair, with cheeks aglow. 
With eyes that beamed like stars. 

what a flash of youth and health, 
And all things good and leal ! 

1 ^d give my all to spin beside 

That girl upon the wheel ! " 

L. G. C. 





There is no disputing about 
tastes, and the matter of bicy- 
cling costume must be settled 
largely by the individual taste 
of each rider. But there are 
one or two axioms that may 
safely be applied to the subject. 

First, long trousers are an abomination in 
riding. 

Secondly, so are braces or " suspenders." 
Thirdly, the looser the leg gear above the 
stockings, the greater the comfort in riding. 

The rider who has once worn short trou- 
sers will not again, unless in case of neces- 
sity, mount his wheel in long ones ; , nor, if 



126 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

he has once substituted a belt for his sus- 
penders, will he willingly put these on again. 
The knickerbocker trousers are much more 
comfortable than the tight knee-breeches. 
The latter, if buttoned at the knee, impede 
the free action of the leg, and, if worn open 
at the knee, catch the dust, besides presenting 
a very slovenly appearance. 

Cycling suits in great variety are to be 
obtained of the dealers in sporting goods, or 
the clothing dealers, in any large city, or 
you may have a suit made to order to suit 
yourself 

Knickerbockers may easily be made by 
adapting a cast-off pair of loose summer 
trousers. Cut these off at about three 
inches below the knee, hem them, and run 
a strong elastic cord into the hem, and the 
work is done. Of the cast-off part of the 
trousers, you may have a cap made, and 
waist-straps to keep the belt in place. 

One of the best cvclinsr suits the writer 
has seen was thus made out of a last year's 
summer suit of a light texture of gray cloth. 
The knickerbockers, sack-coat, and cap were 
worn with gray woollen stockings and a light 



DRESS AND EQUIPMENT. 127 

weight flannel shirt of the same color, with 
russet leather belt and shoes. 

A sack-coat is preferable to a blouse, or 
Norfolk jacket, as being more easily removed 
to be strapped to the handle-bar in warm 
weather. 

The stockings should be long enough to 
reach at least three inches above the knee ; 
and the knickerbockers should be turned 
under so that the elastic will clasp the leg 
well above the knee joint, thus leaving the 
action of the knee absolutely free. 

As the unimpeded action of the knee 
joint is an essential aid to comfortable 
wheeling, nothing can be more absurd than 
the English "cycling costume" figured in 
the fashion plates for the season of 1894, 
with its trousers buttoned tight just below 
the knee, and its stockings laid fold on fold 
over the calf of the leg. The costume would 
seem to have been designed, not to promote 
the comfort of the wearer, but to conceal the 
physical deficiences of some lean and slip- 
pered pantaloon. Jerseys, or "sweaters," so 
called, are very comfortable, but off the 
wheel are not desirable wear. 



128 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

Fine woollen stockings are mucti prefer- 
able to cotton. The best stockings the 
writer has seen were hand-knitted, of soft 
Scotch gray wool. 

Keep two or three sets of gossamer under- 
wear for summer riding. 

A cap with a visor to match the costume 
is the best head-wear. On a hot day, the 
white duck caps are very comfortable. 
These, however, will very soon become 
soiled. If it is desired to wear them, it is 
well to buy several of the cheapest sort, and 
throw them away as they become defaced. 
If you are obliged to ride under an intensely 
hot sun, and do not mind tan or sunburn, 
you will find the best head-gear to be a. 
large white handkerchief wrapped turban- 
wise around the head, and kept wet. A 
black silk cap with a visor is very comfort- 
able in hot weather. 

You may wear bicycle or tennis shoes, 
with rubber soles, if you will ; but you will 
find, after a little practice, that a leather 
sole holds the pedal as well as a rubber one, 
and that an ordinary low-cut russet shoe 
answers every purpose. A low-cut shoe is 



DRESS AND EQUIPMENT. 129 

much better than a laced boot, unless you 
have weak ankles. 

In warm weather you will soon find the 
backs of your hands tanning to a deep and 
healthy brown, like a well colored meer- 
schaum pipe. This color you probably will 
regard as ornamental ; if not, and you wish 
to ride in gloves, choose those woven of Lisle 
thread or silk, rather than kid or dogskin. 

A pair of light leather straps, each about 
fourteen inches lone? and fitted with buckles 
and eyes, which can easily be carried in the 
pocket or around the handle-bar, form a very 
useful article of bicycle equipment. With 
these, your belongings necessary for a two 
days' run, or any articles which you may 
pick up on the road and wish to carry home, 
may be conveniently strapped to the handle- 
bar. 

Many devices for carrying a larger equip- 
ment are sold which answer their purpose 
well. 

Canes or umbrellas, if you have occasion 
to carry them, or a fishing-rod or light rifle, 
or a small camera, may be strapped to the 
top bar of the machine. 




130 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

In fact, if you have strong muscles and 
ride fearlessly, you may carry almost any- 
thing on your wheel which you could carry 
walking. The writer knows a 
professional paper-hanger, who 
for a whole season customarily 
carried wn'th him to and from 
his daily work a large pail of 
paste, adroitly strapped to the 
head of his machine, while his 
paper-hanger's board was bal- 
anced across the bicycle frame, 
and the accompanying paste- 
brush, scissors, etc. tied to the handle-bars. 

Extra weight should be adjusted as far as 
possible to the front of the machine, as the 
centre of gravity of the whole load is thus 
thrown forward, and the work is more equally 
distributed between the two wheels. For a 
like reason, the tool-bag is better carried on 
the top bar close to the " head " than in the 
rear saddle-spring. 

Suppose you are starting on an autumn 
morning for a hundred-mile I'un out and 
home, intending to stop for the night at an 
inn half-way out. What shall be your " kit," 



DJiESS AND EQUIPMENT. 131 

and how will you bestow it ? You will wear 
a medium weight all-wool flannel sliirt, or a 
jersey sweater, — preferably for such a trip the 
shirt, over light underwear, — with sack-coat, 
knickerbockers, leather belt, russet shoes, and 
cap. Take with you a large silk neck muf- 
fler. Leave at home all superfluities in the 
w^ay of things carried in the trousers pocket, 
which are always a nuisance on the bicycle. 
Discard your pocket-book. If you carry a 
cigar-case, wrap bank-notes in tissue paper, 
and put them in the case as the safest place, 
since, whatever else the smoker leaves or 
loses, he will look out for his cigars. Put 
your silver, loose, in your pocket. Your 
keys, except perhaps a watch-key, you will 
not want. The best way to carry your watch 
is in the fob pocket of your knickerbockers 
in a rubber or chamois case, and without the 
chain, which, however worn, will persist in 
catchino- on the saddle in mountincr. A 
match-box and a folding drinkiDg-cup in a 
leather case may be carried in your coat 
pocket. Your sack-coat and shirt should 
keep you sufficiently warm on the wheel ; if 
you are too warm, you may relegate the coat 



132 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

to the handle-bar. Make into the closest 
possible roll a light weight night-gown, a 
change of underwear, an extra handker- 
chief, and a comb and tooth-brush. You 
may make the roll into a brown paper par- 
cel, closely tied, or enclose it in a leather 
or rubber cover. Strap this to the front of 
your handle-bar with the leather straps de- 
scribed above, or with an ordinary shawl- 
strap. 

If the weather is not too cold for pleasure- 
riding, that is if there is not snow on the 
ground, it is warm enough to dispense with 
an overcoat, which is the most troublesome 
of encumbrances on the wheel. If you must 
dress warmly, put on extra underclothing, 
button your coat snugly, and wear a silk muf- 
fler to keep the wind from the throat, and 
woollen gloves, or, better, mittens. A man 
riding a bicycle in an overcoat is not only 
an absurd figure, but, which is more impor- 
tant, he carries unnecessary weight and a sail 
to catch the wind. 

You will find it interesting to keep a rec- 
ord of trips for the season. You may carry 
a note-book for the purpose, setting down 



DRESS AND EQUIPMENT. 133 

the distances travelled as accurately as pos- 
sible, or, if you want an absolutely correct 
record of miles run, use a cyclometer, — get- 
ting none, however, but the best. 

Do not leave your wheel alone where it 
will be exposed to the depredations of 
thieves, small boys looking to steal a ride, 
or malicious tire-puncturers. The use of a 
chain and padlock will at least compel a 
bicycle thief to carry the machine away 
bodily, if at all. 

Ladies' Cycling Dress. 

In the matter of a suitable dress for ladies 
upon the bicycle, there w^ill always be a 
gentle conflict between the subjects of con- 
ventionality, on the one hand, and the ad- 
vocates of positive comfort, on the other. 
Fashion, not the absolute beauty or fitness 
of things, prescribes the gowns of the day ; 
and it has so thoroughly taught us its les- 
son that what is not in fashion seems posi- 
tively ugly, and we believe that whatever is, 
is right. 

But, w4th all masculine diffidence, the 
writer ventures to sketch the outline of a 



134 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

costume for the wheel, which he believes 
would answer all purposes of neatness, utility, 
and comfort. Very full " Zouave " trousers, 
made with an elastic band to be turned 
under just above the knee; (the trousers 
when worn to fall just below the knee ;) 
long leggins to meet the trousers ; loose 
fitting blouse waist with wide collar, to be 
worn under a Zouave jacket, which may on 
occasion be removed and strapped to the 
handle-bar ; round cap with deep visor ; — 
all these from a soft texture of woollen cloth 
of uniform color ; — and a russet leather belt 
and shoes. In warm weather, duck leggins 
and a white duck cap might be worn. 

It will be said that this is a sketch of an 
Amazonian rider; but the answer is that 
only as an Amazon will the wheelwoman 
get the most of health and pleasure out of 
cycling. To ride at all, she must sit the 
saddle " like a man." Why should she not 
mount her wheel like a man, and, like a man, 
enjoy all possible freedom of movement ? 
Then she might discard the heavy " loop- 
frame " bicycle, w4th its wheel-guards and 
dress-guards ; and it is pleasant to know 



DRESS AND EQUIPMENT 135 

that one manufacturer, at least, for the 
season of 1895, will build a light wheel for 
ladies on the exact lines of the men's model. 
When such a wheel comes into general use, 
these lines by a cycling poet will become 
present truth, and not merely melodious 
prophecy : — 

" In older times the woman rode 
As fitted one of subject mind: 
Her lord and master sat before, 
She on a pillion sat behind. 

" But now upon her flying wheel 
She holds her independent way, 
And when she rides a race with man, 
'T is even chance she wins the day." ^ 

It is certain that women on the wheel 
will generally wear either absolute trousers 
or absolute skirts, for the " divided skirt " 
appears already to be relegated to the limbo 
of ugly absurdities ; and it is not easy to 
believe that the hybrid monstrosity in cos- 
tume figured in certain fashion-plates, that 
is, the combination of loose trousers and a 
tightly corseted waist and balloon sleeves, 
will find favor. 

1 A. L. Anderson. 



136 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

lu spite of the reasons of utility and 
comfort that make against it, the majority 
of wheelwomen will probably, for the pres- 
ent, continue to wear the ordinary skirt, 
making it as little obtrusive and trouble- 
some as possible. 

By so much as you will abbreviate the 
length of your skirt will you increase your 
own comfort and safety on the wheel. An 
experienced teacher of cycling, replying to 
inquiries by the writer, says : — 

"In my experience, I have found that it is 
much easier for a woman to learn to mount a 
bicycle when arrayed in ' unconventional ' cos- 
tume. . . . The fewer under-skirts the better, 
especially when one is learning to mount the 
wheel, and the outer skirt should be of light 
weight material, made perfectly plain and with- 
out facing. The skirt should be made to reach 
a little above the ankles." ^ 

As to the details of the ordinary dress, a 
lady writes : — 

1 Mr. L. B. Smith, of the Columbia Eiding School, 
Boston, the value of whose criticisms and suggestions, 
kindly given while this book was in press, the writer 
gratefully acknowledges. 



DRESS AND EQUIPMENT. 137 

" The rider's comfort depends on what she 
wears under the skirt, if the latter be properly- 
lined and shaped, more than on the skirt itself. 
The skirt should be cut so there is no unneces- 
sary fulness about the hips, and yet unpleasant 
scantiness should be positively avoided. To 
begin with, a union under-garment should be 
worn next the skin, varied in fabric and texture 
according to the weather. Over this suit should 
be worn equestrian tights in lieu of underskirts. 
Corsets should never be worn on the wheel. 
Well fitting waists should be substituted. 
* Equestrian' stockings should be black, and 
under a smoothly lined skirt, allowing perfect 
freedom of motion with nothing to entangle in 
pedals or spokes. Shoes should be low and 
broad-toed. . . . For the head, a light weight 
felt tourist's hat is almost universally becoming, 
but whatever style of hat is worn it should be 
entirely devoid of flowers or feathers. . . . 
Jewelry should be left at home. . . . Lisle 
thread gloves are better than kid or silk. . . . 
Every garment worn for riding should be kept 
exclusively for that purpose." ^ 

^ Mary Sargent Hopkins. 



138 pleasure-cycling. 

Tools and Eepair-Kit. 

The regular outfit supplied with the wheel 
usually consists of an air-pump, a small 
monkey-wrench, a screw-driver, an oiler, and, 
when the machine requires it, an instru- 
ment for adjusting bearings. There are also 
included, when a separate repair outfit is 
not furnished, a tube of rubber solution and 
rubber tape for making temporary road 
repairs. In addition to these things, you 
will do well to keep at hand a larger screw- 
driver and a machinist's monkey-wrench, a 
tin or, better, sticks of graphite, a can of 
lubricating oil, which is best bought of a 
responsible dealer in bicycle supplies, and 
enamel lacquer. Suitable brushes with which 
to apply lacquer and dry graphite are neces- 
sary. Spanners which fit the principal nuts 
on the machine, and especially the spoke- 
nipples, are useful; some outfits include a 
special instrument for turning the spoke- 
nipples. You will want an abundance of 
kerosene oil for cleaning ; also two or three 
chamois skins, sponges, soft dusters, pref- 
erably of old woollen or silk, and plenty of 



DRESS AND EQUIPMENT. 139 

woollen rags. Clean cotton waste is useful. 
Add to your equipment some whiting with 
which to remove rust. Keep a tin vessel in 
which to soak out your chain, and two small 
squirt-caDS, one for kerosene and the other 
for lubricating oil. If your machine has a 
wood rim, some shellac finish may be use- 
ful. A sling, with hooks, with which you 
may hang up your wheel, is indispensable, 
and you will want a ball of strong fine 
hemp twine, and a wooden pail or bucket for 
water. 

Keep your outfit together, and always in 
order, so that you can get at anything you 
need in an emergency, and save yourself 
delay and vexation. 

Experience will teach you what tools you 
are likely to want on the road. With a 
single-tube tire, on a short run, the necessary 
things would seem to be the small wrench and 
screw-driver, the air-pump, the rubber tape 
and solution, and twine ; but you may wheel 
for weeks without having occasion to open 
your tool-bag. For a long run, particularly if 
it is to be over country roads, take with you 
the small oiler. Pack the tool-bag carefully, 



140 



PL EASURR-CYCLING. 



using a woollen wrapper for the tools, if 
necessary, so that these may not rattle, nor 
the tube of solution break and make a mess. 
Turn out and examine the contents of the 
tool-bag occasionally, as the steel tools, if left 
lying in the bag, are apt to rust. 




VI. 

CYCLING AND HEALTH. 



" Though near the top of life's long hill, 
And ready for its slow decline, 
I feel again my pulses thrill, 

And drinli again youth's nerving ■wine.'" 

"Beth Day." 

*' I care not for riches or greatness^ 
I bid dull care depart, 
And laugh at dyspeptic sedateness, 

As I spin through the air like a dart" 

Lenox B. Smith. 




VI. 



It has been wisely said by President Eliot 
that " the athletic sports and exercises which 
commend themselves ... are those which 
can be used moderately and steadily, and 
which remain available ... in mature life. 
Such are gymnasium exercises, walking, 
running, rowing, sailing, riding, cycling, ten- 
nis, gunning, bowling, and fencing. The 
youthful expert in any of these sports . . . 
will carry into his strenuous professional 
life a great source of enjoyment and a real 
safeguard of health and of the invaluable 
capacity to endure without injury mental 



144 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

and moral stress. On the other hand, the 
games which demand so much practice and 
such severe training that the brain is tem- 
porarily dulled for all other use, or which 
require a combination of many individuals 
of like powers and tastes, or which contain 
as essential elements violent personal en- 
counters, can have no direct application to 
the after life of professional or business men. 
Moreover, all games which require intense 
training for short periods present a serious 
physical and moral danger for the players, 
— the familiar danger of reaction when 
training stops." 

The writer believes that of the list of 
sports which President Eliot mentions, con- 
sidering these as aids to health and clear- 
thinking, cycling easily leads, and is likely 
to lead, until some sport shall be invented 
which shall bring with it an equal pleas- 
ure for the same modicum of exertion in 
its practice. The sport is to be differen- 
tiated from the others named, in that, first, 
it is the most independent of sports except 
walking or running, and, secondly, that 
the amount of exertion applied to its exer- 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 145 

cise may always be regulated by the strength 
or taste of the individual, and this without 
making the sport irksome. Gymnasium 
exercises are available to comparatively 
few persons, and to most soon grow in- 
sufferably tedious when undertaken as a 
duty. Tennis and bowling both require a 
special equipment for the practice of them^ 
and companions to join the sport, and the 
minimum of physical exertion which each 
calls for is beyond the strength of many fairly 
healthy, but delicate constitutions. Eun- 
ning is for most men past their youth an 
absolutely dangerous sport, and one which 
few women at any time of life can safely 
practise. Most persons find walking for a 
length of time, especially solitary walking, ex- 
tremely wearisome. Gunning, in the absence 
of game, is merely walking with the handi- 
cap of a gun. To fence, you must find an 
adversary of about your own degree of skill 
to make the sport enjoyable. Eowing re- 
quires water and a boat, and sailing a wind 
as well, which may treacherously abandon 
you or set its face against your plans. But 
the cycler, with his wheel under him and 

10 



146 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

mother earth under his wheel, is absolutely in- 
dependent of circumstances, and may set out 
alone or in company, with the world before 
him where to choose. 

Speaking of cycling as a supplement, in 
later years, to the athletic sports practised 
in the colleges, Surgeon Gulp of the United 
States Army says : " Twenty times as many 
men as formerly devote more or less time to 
athletics while at college. These, after de- 
veloping cardiac, pulmonary, and muscular 
systems to the highest point, but too often, 
on the completion of their college life, settle 
down to a sedentary existence absolutely 
without any form of active athletic exer- 
cise. As a result of years of experience 
among this class, I am perfectly convinced 
that sooner or later they lose not only their 
physical strength, but health and vigor as 
well. To such persons the modern bicycle 
becomes much more than a delightful mode 
of recreation, and the lawyer, doctor, mer- 
chant, or preacher finds that his short 
daily ride enables him to do better mental 
work, both as regards quality and quantity, 
than before. Perhaps of even more impor- 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 147 

tance is the fact that consumption, Blight's 
disease, and gout are almost unknown among 
wheelmen, and it has seemed to me that 
college athletes are particularly prone to the 
two former as they approach middle age/' 

Cycling, like rowing, sailing, foot-ball, 
base-ball, riding, and tennis, is not now, 
in the Northern climate, available to any 
extent as a winter sport ; but it is alto- 
gether likely that, with the organization of 
cycling clubs in the larger cities, and perhaps 
in the principal colleges, covered tracks will 
be provided for winter riding, so that the 
sport as a means of exercise may be prac- 
tised in the winter to a much greater extent 
than at present. The writer looks forward 
hopefully to a time when the gymnastic 
training in the principal colleges shall in- 
clude a course of bicycle instruction, and 
when the apparatus of the gymnasium shall 
not be considered complete unless it in- 
clude a sufficient store of bicycles which 
may be loaned or rented to all undergraduate 
comers. 

Dr. C. B. Meding, a New York physician, 
says : " Eide a bicycle for one half-mile, 



148 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

notice the refreshed feeling, the quiver of 
gentle tension, the enthusiasm of vigor ; 
now try to recall your thoughts during the 
half-mile. Am I not right when I say 
that every care and weight has been lifted ? " 
It has already been said that the positive 
tonic effect of this exercise upon mind and 
body both is marvellous. Just before these 
lines were written, a lady said to the 
writer : " The bicycle has been the great- 
est of blessings to my husband. He has 
always seemed fairly well, but always ner- 
vous, and at times afflicted with the worst 
attacks of ' the blues.' These never visit 
him now in the wheeling season, and I shall 
welcome for his sake the opening spring and 
settled roads." Perhaps the exhilarating 
effect of wheeling may be a little like that 
produced temporarily upon a well-balanced 
organization, unaccustomed to the use of 
wines, by taking a glass of champagne, with 
the difference that the effects of the wheel 
exercise are natural and those of the wine 
artificial, and that the stimulus produced by 
the wine must be followed by an intenser 
reaction. As regards cycling, " the cause of 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 149 

this effect," the writer believes, is not far to 
seek. If one inhales a whiff of " laughing 
gas," that is atmospheric air a little over- 
charged with oxygen, he experiences a mo- 
mentary exhilaration, not unlike, while it 
lasts, the exhilaration produced by riding. 
On the wheel, riding in the pure air, if the 
rider sits his saddle as he should, and 
breathes deeply, as he should, the lungs are 
constantly well filled and emptied; and at 
the same time a rapid circulation of the 
blood is induced by the steady muscular 
motion. The body and brain-cells respond 
at once to this quickened and perfected 
oxygenization of the blood, with the result of 
a renewed tone and vigor, both of mind and 
body. 

It may be said, and it is true, that a 
similar effect is produced, for instance, by 
rowing ; but there is this difference, that 
rowing is of necessity a violent exercise, 
which cannot without special training be 
kept up for any great length of time, whereas 
on your wheel you may ride from the sun- 
rise to the sunset of a summer's day, with 
very moderate periods of rest, taking draughts 



150 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

of renewed health and happiness with each 
push of your pedals. 

Says Dr. Meding : " Look at that man or 
woman applying to your immense knowl- 
edge for health. Born healthy ! Bred health- 
fully, yet pale, dispirited, headachy, consti- 
pated, without appetite, sound sleep, and 
ambition. Try your iron, oxygen, arsenic, 
and quinine, your bolus or your fiftieth 
dilution of a milligram. Bah I As well give 
them to the struggling rose-bush in your 
parched back garden. Air is what they 
need, — air in the lungs, — enough to oxy- 
genate, to store up, and then still more to 
increase the residual capacity. . . . Prescribe 
walking ? Such men and w^omen don't walk, 
they meander. ... Is it generally known 
that flabby muscles are the enemy of beauty ? 
Is it generally accepted that fresh air will 
sweeten temper ? . . . These are gospel 
truths. Hippocrates cried centuries ago for 
less medicine and more nature. We want 
less of the bark, resin, and extract of the 
tree, more of its rich beauty. The bright 
flowers and living green of meadow plants I 
sometimes think would do more good than 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 151 

the teas made of their remains. Do I 
exaggerate ? If I tell you many aches, real 
ones, many pains, sharp ones, many unnamed, 
unclassified, but real complaints are to be 
cured by riding a bicycle, will you deride ? 
Not yet, I fancy, have extolling exclamations 
for some recent coal-tar derivatives died out ; 
you did not know even their formula; you 
used them. I suggest a sure adjunct to 
rapid cure, based on daily experience which 
you can obtain for yourself, and I give you 
the formula, — a good bicycle and common 
sense. Can you ignore it ? " 

Cycling, then, is not only the most avail- 
able of sports, but, as regards its effects upon 
the physical well-being, the best and safest, 
because even a very moderate practice of it 
brings, to most temperaments at least, a 
pleasure equal to that which the most violent 
exertion gives. Thus you will find that 
many strong and accomplished riders prefer 
for pleasure riding a gait of from six to eight 
miles per hour. As has already been said, 
one's riding rate will, other things being 
equal, depend very much on his tempera- 
ment, and it will be always the nervous, 



152 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

enthusiastic rider who will be in danger of 
overdoing. 

For cycling, like every other athletic 
exercise, may be rankly abused. For in- 
stauce, a rider has set for himself a forty- 
mile run over hilly roads, a trip which he is 
easily able to make under favorable condi- 
tions. Two or three miles out the wind 
shifts and blows lustily in his face from the 
northeast, bringing with it cold and heavy 
rain. He determines not to be stopped 
by a " little thing like that," and pushes on 
over roads growing heavier with every mile. 
He gets wet through and chilled to the bone, 
he and his machine are covered with mud- 
splashes, and the wheel begins to run hard 
as the bearino's fill with dirt and water. He 
has to dismount and drag his bicycle up hills 
that have never troubled him before. At 
length, he reaches his journey's end, raven- 
ously hungry, perhaps, but not in condition 
to eat heartily. He will be pretty sure to 
catch a bad cold, or a rheumatism, or an 
indigestion ; and will be lucky if he has not 
laid the foundation of some grave functional 
disorder. 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 153 

Again, there is not anywhere a more 
foolish person than the amateur racer, who 
without any real chance of making a dis- 
tinguished record, and without either the 
strength, skill, or training of the kings of 
the track, exhausts himself in inglorious 
contests never to be heard of out of a little 
circle of equally foolish boys. Remember 
too, that, as soon as you begin to make 
cycling a business, you make a toil of a 
pleasure and the best of the sport is gone, 
and, which is worse, you may make that an 
absolute harm which in its judicious prac- 
tice is the best and safest of outdoor amuse- 
ments. 

Speaking of the possible abuses of cycling, 
it is said : — 

" There are objections. What are they ? 
The same that are justly urged against ex- 
travagance. The same objections that can 
be brought against every article of food or 
drink, . . . namely, against the abuser, not 
the thing abused. Drunkards, gluttons, and 
inveterates, are they legitimate arguments 
against anything but themselves ? 

" To see a rider bent into a tipsy W, flying 



154 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

and panting on a wheel, to hear of some 
clogged heart that for twenty years has 
objected to curbstones, having stopped after 
a bicycle ride, to hear of the broken heads of 
rash coasters, the hoarse voices of relay riders, 
these are not objections. As well does the 
victim of the morphine habit prove opium 
a curse." 

The writer has spoken of a road rate of 
from ten to twelve miles per hour as one 
easily to be attained by the average wheel- 
man on good roads, such as for instance are 
to be found in the radius of twenty miles 
from Boston. But the capacity of making 
this rate with comfort and safety depends 
upon the condition of the rider, or rather 
upon his constitution. If his lungs are 
sound and strong, he may make and keep 
such a rate, feeling pretty sure that he can 
maintain it until his legs get tired, which 
they will not do for several hours if the 
rider takes five minutes every hour for rest. 
If you have weak lungs, you should not ride 
at such a pace as to get winded or attempt 
hard hills. If you ride perseveringly, stop- 
ping whenever you get out of breath, and not 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 155 

taking the saddle again until you are fully 
recovered, you will find at the end of each 
week that your endurance and lung capacity 
have sensibly increased. 

If moderate exercise on the wheel develops 
a palpitation or pain about the heart, stop 
at once, and do not mount your wheel ex- 
cept under the advice and direction of your 
physician. It may be that the exercise in a 
moderate degree will cure you, or it may be 
that you must abandon it altogether, but 
you should not be your own judge in the 
matter. 

If you have no functional disorder, you 
may from the beginning safely put into your 
work on the bicycle all the merely muscular 
exertion of which you are capable. The 
fatigue, or slight lameness, which hard work 
may at first induce, will do you no harm, 
and will be amply compensated by the tonic 
effect of the sport on all the bodily func- 
tions. If you sit your saddle rightly, that is, 
in an erect position, you cannot help breathing 
freely and deeply, and at the same time the 
rapid action of the leg muscles will induce 
a quick and full circulation of the blood 



156 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

throughout the system. You are getting 
pure air and exercise as active as you choose 
to make it, and the result will be a clear 
head, a sound digestion, and an absolute qui- 
etude of your obtrusive " nerves." 

As compared with walking, cycling re- 
quires an increased action of the knee and 
ankle joints, and, in addition to the exercise 
of the muscles used in w^alking or running, 
it employs another set of muscles for the 
" push " movement which ordinarily have 
been but slightly developed. It is therefore 
in the knee, the ankle, and in the pushing 
muscles, that the beginner is most likely to 
feel fatigue, and it may require several 
weeks of practice to bring him into such 
condition that he can endure a fifty-mile run 
without some slight lameness of these parts 
following. So, during the off season, you 
will lose something of what you have gained 
in strength in the muscles which are resting, 
unless you are within reach of a riding- 
school and practise there for an hour or two 
each week. 

The beneficial effect of cycling to cure in- 
cipient rheumatism, or weakness of the knees 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 157 

or ankles, is positive and wonderful. If you 
are afflicted with these ills, or either of them, 
and are able to ride without actual discom- 
fort, even for the shortest period of time, try 
the wheel, and ride perseveringly. If you 
can keep the saddle at first but five min- 
utes, you may be sure that in a week or 
two your endurance will be doubled, and 
that probably in a month your strong new 
legs will laugh at the weak members which 
they have displaced. 

In a newspaper anecdote, the lean lady is 
made to say to the stout one, " How delight- 
ful that you have a bicycle too ! I go every 
morning because doctor says I shall certainly 
grow stouter." To which the stout lady re- 
plies, " Perfectly lovely ! We '11 go together. 
I go because the doctor tells me that it will 
decrease my weight." The contradiction is 
not so absurd as it seems, for the lean dys- 
peptic, for example, as the exercise gradually 
strengthens his digestion, will find his flesh 
and weight increasing, while the fat and 
hitherto lazy man will certainly reduce him- 
self to a comfortable leanness in the course 
of a season's persistent riding. 



158 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

Cyclers in their first season, who are just 
beginning to take long rides, may find the 
foUowinoj su^aestions of use. 

When at work on the wheel, keep your 
lungs always well inflated, breathing through 
the nostrils and keeping the mouth closed. 
Keep the chin up, the shoulders well braced 
back, and, although you may have sometimes 
to lean forward in the saddle, never stoop at 
the shoulders. Do not acquire the bad habit 
of riding with the hands close to the steer- 
ing-post of the machine ; this position con- 
tracts the shoulders and so lessens the lung 
capacity, as does also the use of a very short 
handle-bar. For a man of ordinary size, a 
bar measuring twenty-four inches in a straight 
line from tip to tip is not too long. 

Do not ride with a saddle that persistently 
hurts you. The difficulty may disappear 
after a short rest ; if not, a slight change in 
the saddle adjustment may relieve it. If 
your saddle constantly troubles you, discard 
it and try another pattern ; if you find 
nothing but the old-fashioned hammock 
saddle comfortable, use that in spite of its 
weight. 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 159 

Do not ride fasting. If you go out for an 
early morning run, take a glass of milk, or a 
cup of black coffee, and a roll, before starting. 
You may ride ten or fifteen miles upon this, 
and return with a marvellous appetite for a 
more substantial breakfast. 

If you can take but a short rest at dinner 
time on a long run, do not eat a heavy 
meal. A lunch of eggs or raw oysters, or 
both, with milk or black coffee, will keep you 
in good shape for road work, and you will 
avoid the danger of the indigestion which a 
heavy dinner without a rest after it may 
induce. 

It is much better to rest for an hour after 
dinner than to resume riding at once, espe- 
cially if you have eaten heartily, but a longer 
rest than this is not necessary. If you are 
obliged to ride immediately after a meal, ride 
moderately at first. 

As to drinking water on the road, the same 
rule is to be observed as in mountain climb- 
ing, horseback riding, or any other athletic 
exercise ; that is, if you perspire freely, you 
may drink as freely as you choose, so long 



160 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

as you do not drink ice-water, or other 
extremely cold drink. But if you do not per- 
spire, you must drink with the greatest mod- 
eration. The use of alcoholic liquors while 
actually engaged in riding, or any other active 
exercise, is to be strictly avoided. It not only 
utterly upsets the balance, so to speak, of the 
physical system, but it has the immediate 
effect of inducing a shortness of breath, and so 
disabling the rider. Ginger ale is an ex- 
cellent and most refreshing drink for a long 
run on a hot day ; and this may be taken 
rather freely by persons who are obliged to 
drink very sparingly of water. 

An excellent thing to carry in the pocket 
on a hard ride is a stick or two of choc- 
olate, sweet or not as you prefer, done up in 
tinfoil, as it is sold in the shops. This, 
with a hard biscuit or two, will make on a 
pinch a very satisfactory lunch. 

You may smoke, if you will, on easy 
ground, and will not find that it intereferes 
with your riding, that is, if your lungs are 
strong, and the exercise does not " wind " 
you. But if you have a hard hill to climb. 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 161 

throw away your cigar. Your lungs are to 
be taxed, and in cycling, as in mountain 
climbing or rowing, good sound breathing 
and smoking are incompatible. 



Avoid, so far as you can, getting heated on 
the road in cool weather. To this end, wear 
the minimum of clothing while actually in 
the saddle. Down to the end of October, 
you will find that, generally, the best place 
for your coat is the handle-bar. If you are 
warm on dismounting, lose no time in un- 
strapping your coat and putting it on. Xo 
matter how cool the weather, you run little 
risk of catching cold while actually riding, 
the only real danger being in the exposure 
of the throat to the wind, which will strike 
keenly if you ride even at a moderate gait. 
So you should never leave home without a 
silk or wool muffler for the throat. Wear- 
ing this, you may be sure that the rest of 
your body will take care of itself, that is, if 
you are in good condition. 

If you are warm on getting in from a run, 
lose no time in making a complete change of 
clothing, taking, if possible, a rapid sponge 
II 



162 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

bath and a hard rub with a cbarse bath 
towel. Thus you will avoid a possible cold. 
If you are to take a long run, carry with 
you, no matter what else you leave behind, a 
change of underclothing, and do not neglect 
to change at once when you come to a long 
halt. 

The stiffness of the muscles and knee 
joints which sometimes follows a long run 
will generally yield to a warm bath and a 
vigorous rubbing with a coarse towel, which 
may be wet with a dilution of bay rum. 
Some professional riders use freely a liniment 
made up of equal parts of alcohol and 
hamamelis. 

In conclusion. Give all your leisure, for 
one summer, to the wheel. Eide wisely and 
moderately ; and you will understand, per- 
haps for the first time in your mature life, 
the significance of the expression, " a sound 
mind in a sound body." Dreamless sleep, 
unobtrusive digestion, clear mental action, 
wholesome thous^hts, and the relish for 
healthy pleasures, — all these will be yours 
in full measure, and you will see that "a 



CYCLING AND HEALTH. 163 

new era, not merely of physical vigor, but 
also of mental and moral health, has been 
inaugurated by this light, swift, joy-giving^ 
marvellous means of locomotion." 




VII. 

ON THE EOAD. 



" When all the world wasfree^ 
And naught of care had we. 
Bach grassy blade, each forest shade, 
Each winding stream, we thought was made 
For our long jubilee." 

J. Andrews Cone. 




YII. 




Cycling gratifies the love of 
adventure which is latent in 
everybody. You may make 
a little journey into the 
world on your wheel, and, 
although you travel but a 
^^- hundred miles from your 

home, you will be surprised to find how 
much of interest and amusement you meet 
along new roads, and among fresh faces and 
unfamiliar landscapes. 

Get a good road-map of the country for 
forty miles around your home ; study routes 
and distances with its help ; learn where 



168 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

the comfortable country iuns are ; plan for 
each long ride a route in advance, and do 
the whole region thoroughly. After a 
month's or two months' practice, you will 
be able easily to take a twenty or twenty- 
five mile route out before dinner, dine and 
rest, and run home easily in the afternoon; 
or you may plan a hundred-mile trip out 
and home, resting over night at your fifty- 
mile objective point. 

You may be happy enough to have 
secured a week's or a fortnight's outing, 
and wise enough to devote it to the com- 
panionship of your wheel. In this case, 
you will make deliberate preparations for a 
long trip. You will arrange an itinerary, 
or select one from the League " Eoad-Book," 
showing routes and stopping places for each 
day's run, and make your map a part of 
your equipment. 

The wheelman, at least in the east, will 
find many road-maps in the market, some 
good and some nearly worthless. For all- 
round use in the country regions of Massa- 
chusetts, the writer prefers the plates of the 
standard Massachusetts Atlas, published by 



ON THE ROAD. 169 

George H. Walker & Co., of Boston. These 
twenty-seven in number, and covering the 
entire State, are sold separately folded in 
stiff' covers, and can easily be carried in the 
pocket. The scale is an inch to the mile: 
the roads are very accurately laid down, and 
the character of them as being good or bad, 
fairly well indicated. Contour lines in color 
indicate heights above the sea level. Eail- 
way crossings at grade, or over or under 
grade, and churches, school-houses, and 
cemeteries (which often serve as landmarks 
in a strange country), are also indicated. By 
the study of these maps, the rider may form 
a reasonably good notion, in advance, of the 
character of a proposed new route. 

If you wish to keep in touch with the 
bicycling world, besides enjoying the sub- 
stantial advantages which attach to a mem- 
bership in the way of special rates at many 
hotels, and the use of its excellent Eoad- 
Books, you will probably join the League of 
American Wheelmen. 

The League was formed at Newport, 
Rhode Island, May 31, 1880. It grew out 



170 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

of suggestions made by Charles E. Pratt, of 
Boston, who was its first President. The 
objects of it, as set forth in its original con- 
stitution, and which lm¥©ibeen substantially 
adhered to since, were "to promote the 
general interests of bicycling, to ascertain, 
defend, and protect the rights of wheelmen, 
and to encourage and facilitate touring." It 
is^largely owing to the efforts of the League 
and its officers that the legal rights of 
cyclers upon the road have been ascertained, 
and clearly defined ; and its efforts directed 
to the improvement of the public highways 
of the country deserve grateful recognition 
by all good citizens, whether cyclers or not. 
The official organ of the association is the 
''L. A. W. Bulletin," and in January, 1892, 
it commenced the publication of the well 
known magazine, " Good Eoads." ^ 

The Eoad-Books published by the League, 
and not easily to be obtained except by its 
members, are the result of infinite patient 
disinterested effort on the part of wheelmen 
and the officers of the League in charge of 

1 The " Bulletin " and "Good Roads " are now, April, 
1895, consolidated. 



ON THE ROAD. 171 

the work. The books give in detail dis- 
tances, character and grades of roads, land- 
marks and stopping places along a great 
number of the principal highways in the 
different States in which they are severally 
issued, and include maps giving the general 
course and direction of the roads. The 
seventh and latest edition of the Massachu- 
setts Eoad-Book was issued in 1894. 

Your outfit, if small, you may take with 
you in a "luggage carrier," or in a valise 
made to fit within the frame of your bicycle, 
or you may reduce your irii'pedimenta to 
what may be strapped to the handle-bar, 
sending on other baggage from point to 
point by express. 

If you start for a long trip, make up your 
mind not to be annoyed by trivial things, 
nor to fret if your plans are deranged by bad 
weather or unforeseen happenings. A rainy 
day in a country inn may indeed be dull, 
but this like everything else will pass, and 
you will only add to your own discomfort 
and that of others, by taking it hardly. 
Above all, do not get obstinately bent on 



172 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

pushing on through wet and wind. If you 
are a good wheelman, you should be also 
an every-day philosopher, and, as such, 
superior to all petty vexations. If you 
will take things as they come, and refrain 
from fidgeting and worrying, you will find 
your week on a bicycle a bright spot in 
your remembrance as long as you live, and 
when your faithful wheel brings you back to 
your own door, you will dismount from it 
feeling yourself a giant refreshed. 

The diligent cycler becomes, perforce, a 
keen student of topography. In the course 
of a season on the wheel, you will become 
intimately acquainted with every road with- 
in a reach of twenty miles from your home. 
You will know the hard hills and the easy 
ones ; the troublesome ruts in one road, the 
smooth hard-beaten footpaths that border 
another for miles ; the sandy roads that are 
impassable in dry weather, but which a 
summer thunder-shower beats hard for you ; 
and the wet woodland byways that only 
weeks of sunshine will make tolerable. 
You note the changes which the hurrying 



ON THE ROAD. 173 

season brings, — the maple sapling, pre- 
maturely scarlet, in the marsh, the ripening 
of the hops upon the farmer's vine, and the 
purpling of the wild grapes in some thicket 
of which in July you discovered the secret. 
In the season you scent the laden hay- 
rigging by the fragrant wisps that it drops 
behind it along the road, long before you 
hear the creaking of its laboring wheels. 
The Indian corn you watch from its youth 
of silky greenness to the day of its solid 
golden maturity ; and you anticipate the 
coming time when the surly green apples 
overhanc^ino; the road shall soften to a 
mellow crimson. 

But the pleasures of cycling are not to be 
obtained only from long runs and country 
rides. You may choose for your riding the 
suburban parks and " boulevards," which, 
on a summer afternoon, you will find dotted 
all over with the swift-gliding wheels of 
others, like yourself on health and pleasure 
bent. For the beauty of wild landscapes, — 
the hill pastures, the thick woods, and the 
tangle of golden-rod and asters by the road- 



174 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

sides, — • you enjoy now the more conventional 
charm of well kept lawns and flower gar- 
dens ; and instead of farmhouses and country 
school-houses, you spin by Queen Anne 
cottages and shingle-sided villas ; — all these 
scattered along roads over which your 
machine almost moves itself, so that noth- 
ing diverts your attention from the beauty 
in nature and art which surrounds you, or 
from the living beauty which meets you on 
the way. 

The city wheelman has offered him for 
exploration miles of park and suburban 
beauty. The wonderful zone of gardens, 
hills, and villages that surrounds Boston ; 
the noble asphalted streets and avenues of 
Washington ; Eiverside, and Central Park, 
Druid Hill and Fairmount; and the mag- 
nificent chain of boulevards and parks that 
girdles Chicago ; — any of these furnish room 
for a season's cycling. 

On a bright June Saturday, as you sit 
at your desk, despatching with unwonted 
celerity the business of the day, you will 
bless the beneficent and growing custom 
which is making a half-holiday on the 



ON THE ROAD. 175 

seventh day of the week, -antil at length 
you are ready to close safe-door and "roll- 
top," with a clang and a slam, and hasten 
to where your patient wheel, shining and 
well oiled over night, is waiting for you. 
You grudge the accustomed delay of the 
steam or electric line that takes you 
home, and, once there, you 
lose no time in discarding the 
starched garments of conven- 
tionality and slipping into 
your loose-fitting knickerbock- 
ers and flannels. You vault 
into the saddle and give your 
first push to the pedals, and the cares that 
have infested the week are forgotten and for 
an afternoon you are a boy again, as you join 
the crowd on the suburban roads, or in 
the driveways of the neighboring park, or 
run a half-score of miles to some unexplored 
village, or perhaps spin over the long stretch 
of a hard sea-beach within easy reach of the 
city. 

Not all the enjoyments of a healthy sport 
are to be found in its present exercise, but 




176 PLEASURE-C YCLING. 

the pleasures of it are also in memory and 
anticipation. To the wheelman who loves 
Nature, — who keeps his eyes open to the 
pictures that she paints for him, his ears 
alive to the symphonies of the winds and 
the brooks, the songs of the birds, and the 
whisperings of the sea, — who appreciates 
the humors and whimsicalities of every-day 
life and makes even a superficial study of 
them as they pass before him in the pano- 
rama which he watches from the saddle, — 
the adventures and happenings of a season 
on the wheel may, in the retrospect, enliven 
many a dull day or winter evening. 

You may, if you crave the satisfaction of 
benefiting others while you are amusing 
yourself, select some good route not yet 
described in your Eoad-Books, and set your- 
self the task of thoroughly exploring and 
noting it, at the end of the season making 
up your notes into the form of the League 
routes, and sending the result to the proper 
quarter. 

If you are a photographer, you may make 
your camera a part of your bicycle outfit, 
and it will preserve for your future enjoy- 




ON THE ROAD. 177 

ment hundreds of souvenirs of men and 
things. 

If, better still, you are an artist, even if 
your capacity is limited to making a toler- 
able sketch in water color 
or black and white, you 
may carry along your 
sketching materials, sure 
of abundant opportunity 
for using them. If you 
can make clever sketches, 
truthful or whimsical, of 
the persons you meet, so much the better. 

If you can do none of these things, you 
can at least write, and you will find a book 
of notes of your season's runs, not only inter- 
esting as recalling the memories of pleasant 
days, but full of bits of useful knowledge 
for the wheelman and local topographer. 

Note each run of any consequence that you 
make ; the distance of it by the cyclometer, 
if you use one, — if not as nearly as you can 
by the map and scale ; and the time made 
from point to point. Note the weather, the 
character and condition of the roads over 
which you travel. Mention the odd things 

12 



178 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

and queer people whom you meet, the ac- 
quaintances you make, the inns at which 
you stop and what they serve you for dinner. 
Do not say, " This or that is trivial, it would 
be childish to note it." You are not at work, 
but at play, and to the child at play nothing 
is childish. It is the best of this noble 
sport that, to the busy man, it brings back, 
while his wlieels whirl, his lost youth ; and 
if you are to be young, you may as well 
begin as near the beginning as possible. 

You may come home with your pockets 
ballasted with geological specimens, or with 
your machine loaded with bunches of golden- 
rod and swamp pink ; if you 
have any special interest that 
connects you with the world of 
outward nature, you will find 
something to interest you. You 
may if you like take out with 
you a book to read ; but you 
probably will not read it. If you can be 
content to lie under a tree and take the 
world at second hand from the pages of a 
book, while your wheel waits impatiently 
at your feet begging you to ride it, and all 




ON THE ROAD. 179 

the world of reality lies before you to ex- 
plore, you are at least an oddity. 

Some good friend will tell you that wheel- 
ing is a selfish solitary sport ; another, that 
it can only be practised with pleasure in 
good company. You will bear these slanders 
with equanimity, well knowing that neither 
is true. Cycling is certainly the most inde- 
pendent of sports. There are times when 
you want no companion but your silent 
wheel, and then it will not fail you. A 
solitude in which you cannot brood or fret 
may be just what appeals to you after a 
week of wrangling in the courts, or chaffer- 
ing in the market, or with the prospect 
before you of facing a sea of faces, dull or 
attentive, in a pulpit on the morrow. At 
such a time you will turn from the haunts 
of men to wheel over miles of country road, 
through the woods perhaps, or along the 
autumn sea-shore, with the wheel and cheer- 
ful thoughts for your only companions. 
Again you will want company, considering 
that a pleasure shared with another is a 
pleasure doubled ; and then your cycle runs 



180 PLEASURE-CYCLING. 

alongside that of some friend of like disposi- 
tion, and you both talk faster than you ever 
talked before. Or you may be disposed to 
join a merry company of cyclers, and, con- 
tented to set your pace to that of the weak- 
est wheel, go out for a day's prescribed run. 
Thus it is the prime advantage of the sport 
that it suits almost any mood of mind in 
which you can approach it. 

But the twilight draws on, and it is time 
to turn the cycle and to push soberly towards 
home. And so to the fellow wd:ieelmen and 
wheelwomen who have made the afternoon's 
run in his company, and who he hopes have 
enjoyed it half as well as he has, the writer, 
wishing to each and every one of them " more 
power to his wheel," rings a farewell salute 
upon his bell and says good-by. 




INDEX. 



INDEX. 



American Wheelmen, League of, 169. 

Ankle movement, 71, 73. 

Back-pedalling, 73. 

Balancing, 68. 

Ball-bearings, 39 ; adjustment of, 109, 111. 

Bell, 38. 

Bicycle. See Safety Bicycle. 

Block Cliain, 43. 

Body-steering, 81, 82. 

Brakes, 38 ; " Spoon " and "Band," 57. 

Bulletin, L. A. W., 170. 

Celeripede, The, 33. 

Central Park, riding in, permitted, 95, n. 

Chain, 38, 43; oiling and lubricating, 112; cleaning, 

111 ; tension of, 120. 
Cleaning and oiling, 110. 
Coasters, 38. 
Coasting, 90, 91. 

Costume, for men, 125 ; for women, 133. 
Creeping Tires, 56, 57. 

Cycling, as a sport, 13 ; in its relation to health, 143. 
Cyclometer, 38. 
Dead-points, 72, 73. 
Dismounting, 68, 77, 79, 80. 



184 INDEX. 

Drasine, the, 33. 

Dress, 98, 125, 133, 161. 

Dress-guards, 62. 

Eating and drinking, 159, 160. 

Enamel, repairing, 114. 

Equipment for run, 129, 130, 131, 132 ; repair, 138. 

Foot-rests, 38. 

Foot-steering, 83, 84, 85. 

Fork, the, 38. 

Frame, 37, 42. 

Gear, what, and effect of, 39, 51 ; how calculated, 52 ; 

tables of, 53, 54 ; choice of, 55 ; round and elliptical, 

55 ; rigid and bevelled, 37 ; changeable, 55 ; of ladies' 

wheels, 55. 
Good Roads, magazine, 170. 

Handle-bar, 60 ; adjustment of, 74 ; length of, 158. 
Handles, dropped and upright, 60. 
Hands off, riding, 84, 85. 
Head, the, 37. 
Head-wear, 128, 134. 
Hill-climbing, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89. 
Hobby-horses, 33. 
Inflation of tire, 114, 115, 116. 
Joints of frame, 42. 
Knickerbockers, 126. 
Lantern-clip, 3& 
Lap-joints, 42. 
Law, of the road, 92; "Liberty," of New York, 95, n. ; 

regulating use of bicycles, 92, 93 and n. 
League of American Wheelmen, 169. 
Luggage equipment, 129. 

Massachusetts, law as to use of bicycles in, 93, n. 
Momentum of wheel, effect of, 50. 
Mounting, ^^, 11, 78, 79, 80. 
New York " Liberty Law," 95, n. 



INDEX. 185 

iSTiglit -riding, 91. 

Oiling and cleaning, 110. 

Pedal- crank, 37 ; repairing when bent, 121. 

Pedals, 37, 61 ; how suspended, 39. 

Pneumatic Saddle, 60, 

Pneumatic Tires, 38, 40; inflation of, 114 ; repairing, 116. 

Position of mounted rider, 75, 80. 

Power, how applied, 40. 

Pushing-stroke, 40, 70, 71, 72, 73. 

Rate of riding, 99, 100 ; regulated by law, 93, n. 

Rat-trap Pedals, 61. 

Rear-fork, 38. 

Repair-kit, 138. 

Repairs, general, 118 ; of tires, 116, 117, 118; of pedal- 
crank, 121. 

Road-books, 170. 

Road-maps, 168. 

Saddle, 38, 59 ; adjustment of, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 158. 

Saddle-post, 38. 

Saddle-rod, 38. 

Safety Bicycle, military use of, 15, n. ; history of, 33 ; 
parts of, 37 ; mechanical principles of, 40 ; life of, 45 ; 
second-hand, 45 ; weight of, 46 ; racing, 48 ; gears of, 
52 ; is a vehicle, 92 ; care of, 107 ; general repairs of, 
118 ; parts of, interchangeable, 122. 

Shoes, 128. 

Single-tube Tires, 56. 

Smoking, 160. 

Spokes, tangential arrangement of, 41 ; testing, 119. 

Spring-forks, 40, n. 

Sprocket, 37. 

Sprocket-bracket, 37. 

Steering, 76, 77, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85. 

Steering-post, 38. 

Step, 38. 



186 INDEX. 

Stockings, 127, 128. 

Stoop, the, 74, 75, 85. 

Tension, of spokes, 119 ; of chain, 120. 

Throw, the, 55. 

Tires, 38 ; single and double, 56 ; creeping, 56, 57 ; infla- 
tion of, 114, 115, 116 ; mending, 116, 117, 118. 

Toe-clips, 61. 

Tools, 138. 

Valves, 38, 115. 

Vertical Push, 72, 73. 

"Weight, distribution of, between bearings, 42 ; of load, 
what, 50 ; of bicycle, 46 et seq. 

Wheel-guards, 62. 

AVheeling for turn, 81. 

Wheels, 37. 

Wood Rim, 47. 






mm^i 





